Chris Hedges's Blog, page 438

Swelling Migrant Caravan Resumes March to U.S.

CIUDAD HIDALGO, Mexico—A growing throng of Central American migrants resumed their advance toward the U.S. border in southern Mexico on Sunday, overwhelming Mexican government attempts to stop them at the border.

Their numbers swelled to about 5,000 overnight and at first light they set out walking toward the Mexican town of Tapachula, 10 abreast in a line stretching approximately a mile (1.5 kilometers).

Several hundred more already had applied for refugee status in Mexico and an estimated 1,500 were still on the Guatemalan side of the Suchiate River, hoping to enter legally.

It was not immediately clear where the additional travelers had materialized from since about 2,000 had been gathered on the Mexican side Saturday night. They seemed likely to be people who had been waiting in the Guatemalan town of Tecun Uman and who decided to cross during the night.

They marched on through Mexico like a ragtag army of the poor, shouting triumphantly slogans like “Si se pudo!” or “Yes, we could!”

As they passed through Mexican villages on the outskirts of Ciudad Hidalgo, they drew applause, cheers and donations of food and clothing from Mexicans.

Maria Teresa Orellana, a resident of the neighborhood of Lorenzo handed out free sandals to the migrants as they passed. “It’s solidarity,” she said. “They’re our brothers.”

In the tropical heat, Besi Jaqueline Lopez of San Pedro Sula carried an improbable stuffed polar bear with a winter cap, the favorite — and only — toy of her two daughters, Victoria 4 and Elisabeth, 3, as they trudged beside her, all covered in sweat.

A business administration graduate, Lopez said she couldn’t find work in Honduras. She wants to reach the USA but would stay in Mexico if she could find work here. “My goal is to find work for a better future for my daughters,” she said. Her husband, David Martinez, said they were tired, but had to push on to reach their goal of making it to the U.S.

Olivin Castellanos, 58, a truck driver and mason from Villanueva, Honduras, said he took a raft across the river after Mexico blocked the bridge. “No one will stop us, only God,” he said. “We knocked down the door and we continue walking.” He wants to reach the U.S. to work. “I can do this,” he said, pointing to the asphalt under his feet. “I’ve made highways.”

The migrants, who said they gave up trying to enter Mexico legally because the asylum application process was too slow and most want to continue to the U.S., gathered Saturday at a park in the border city of Ciudad Hidalgo. They voted by a show of hands to continue north en masse, then marched to the bridge crossing the Suchiate River and urged those still on it to come join them.

The decision to re-form the migrant caravan capped a day in which Mexican authorities again refused mass entry to migrants on the bridge, instead accepting small groups for asylum processing and giving out 45-day visitor permits to some. Authorities handed out numbers for people to be processed in a strategy seen before at U.S. border posts when dealing with large numbers of migrants.

But many became impatient and circumventing the border gate, crossing the river on rafts, by swimming or by wading in full view of the hundreds of Mexican police manning the blockade on the bridge. Some paid locals the equivalent of $1.25 to ferry them across the muddy waters. They were not detained on reaching the Mexican bank.

Sairy Bueso, a 24-year old Honduran mother of two, was another migrant who abandoned the bridge and crossed into Mexico via the river. She clutched her 2-year-old daughter Dayani, who had recently had a heart operation, as she got off a raft.

“The girl suffered greatly because of all the people crowded” on the bridge, Bueso said. “There are risks that we must take for the good of our children.”

In addition to those who crossed the river, immigration agents processed migrants in small groups and then bused them to an open-air, metal-roof fairground in Tapachula, where the Red Cross set up small blue tents on the concrete floor.

Mexico’s Interior Department said it had received 640 refugee requests by Hondurans at the border crossing. It released photos of migrants getting off buses at a shelter and receiving food and medical attention.

On Sunday, federal police monitored the caravan’s progress from a helicopter and had a few units escorting it. Outside Tapachula about 500 federal police briefly gathered along the highway on buses and in patrol units, but officers said their instructions were to maintain traffic on the highway not stop the caravan. They moved on toward Tapachula before the caravan reached them.

Migrants cited widespread poverty and gang violence in Honduras, one of the world’s deadliest nations by homicide rate, as their reasons for joining the caravan.

Juan Carlos Mercado, 20, from Santa Barbara, Honduras, says corruption and a lack of jobs in Honduras has stymied him. “We just want to move ahead with our lives,” he said Sunday. He said he’d do any kind of work.

The caravan elicited a series of angry tweets and warnings from Trump early in the week, but Mexico’s initial handling of the migrants at its southern border seemed to have satisfied him more recently.

“So as of this moment, I thank Mexico,” Trump said Friday at an event in Scottsdale, Arizona. “I hope they continue. But as of this moment, I thank Mexico. If that doesn’t work out, we’re calling up the military — not the Guard.”

“They’re not coming into this country,” Trump added.

“The Mexican Government is fully engaged in finding a solution that encourages safe, secure, and orderly migration,” State Department Spokeswoman Heather Nauert said Saturday, “and both the United States and Mexico continue to work with Central American governments to address the economic, security, and governance drivers of illegal immigration.”

After an emergency meeting in Guatemala, presidents Hernandez of Honduras and Jimmy Morales of Guatemala said an estimated 5,400 migrants had entered Guatemala since the caravan was announced a week ago, and about 2,000 Hondurans have returned voluntarily.

Morales said a Honduran migrant died in the town of Villa Nueva, 20 miles (30 kilometers) from Guatemala City, when he fell from a truck.

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Mark Stevenson reported from Ciudad Hidalgo, and Sonia Perez D. reported from Tecun Uman, Guatemala. Associated Press writers Sonny Figueroa in Guatemala City and Peter Orsi in Mexico City contributed to this report.

Bolton Faces Tense Talks With Russia Over Nuclear Treaty

MOSCOW—U.S. National Security Adviser John Bolton faces two days of high-tension talks in Moscow beginning Monday after President Donald Trump announced his intention to withdraw from a landmark nuclear weapons treaty.

Trump’s announcement that the United States would leave the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces, or INF, treaty brought sharp criticism on Sunday from Russian officials and from former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev, who signed the treaty in 1987 with President Ronald Reagan.

Trump said Russia has violated terms of the treaty that prohibit the U.S. and Russia from possessing, producing or test-flying ground-launched nuclear cruise missiles with a range of 500 to 5,500 kilometers (300 to 3,400 miles).

Russia has repeatedly denied allegations that it has produced and tested such a missile.

Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov was quoted as telling state news agency Tass that leaving the treaty “would be a very dangerous step.”

It would “cause the most serious condemnation from all members of the international community who are committed to security and stability.”

Konstatin Kosachev, head of the foreign affairs committee in Russia’s upper house of parliament, said on Facebook that a U.S. withdrawal from the treaty would mean “mankind is facing full chaos in the nuclear weapons sphere.”

“Washington’s desire to turn back politics cannot be supported. Not only Russia, but also all who cherish the world, especially a world without nuclear weapons, must declare this,” Gorbachev was quoted as telling the Interfax news agency.

Western reaction was mixed.

British Defense Secretary Gavin Williamson said the U.K. stands “absolutely resolute” with Washington on the issue and called on the Kremlin to “get its house in order,” according to the Financial Times.

German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said that Trump’s announcement “raises difficult questions for us and Europe,” but noted that Russia hasn’t cleared up allegations of violating the treaty.

The Kremlin hasn’t directly commented on Trump’s statement, but spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Sunday that “after the last statements, explanations of the American side will be required.” Bolton and Russian President Vladimir Putin will meet on Tuesday. On Monday, Bolton meets with Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.

The prospect of withdrawing from the INF adds to the substantial tensions between Washington and Moscow, including allegations of Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election and sanctions imposed over Russia’s involvement in the eastern Ukraine conflict.

On Friday, the U.S. announced criminal charges against a Russian for alleged attempts to influence next month’s midterm elections.

The treaty helps protect the security of the U.S. and its allies in Europe and the Far East, but has constrained the U.S. from developing new weapons.

The U.S. will begin developing them unless Russia and China agree not to possess or develop the weapons, Trump said. China isn’t a party to the pact.

“We’ll have to develop those weapons, unless Russia comes to us and China comes to us and they all come to us and say ‘let’s really get smart and let’s none of us develop those weapons,’ but if Russia’s doing it and if China’s doing it, and we’re adhering to the agreement, that’s unacceptable,” he said.

Trump didn’t provide details about violations. But in 2017, White House national security officials said Russia had deployed a cruise missile in violation of the treaty. Earlier, the Obama administration accused the Russians of violating the pact by developing and testing a prohibited cruise missile.

Russia has repeatedly denied that it has violated the treaty and has accused the U.S. of not being in compliance.

Defense Secretary James Mattis has previously suggested that a Trump administration proposal to add a sea-launched cruise missile to Washington’s nuclear arsenal could provide the U.S. with leverage to try to persuade Russia to come back in line on the arms treaty.

Russia’s Foreign Ministry said in February that the country would only consider using nuclear weapons in response to an attack involving nuclear or other weapons of mass destruction, or in response to a non-nuclear assault that endangered the survival of the Russian nation.

Trump’s decision could prove controversial with European allies and others who see value in the treaty, said Steven Pifer, a former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine and now a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution who focuses on nuclear arms control.

“Once the United States withdraws from the treaty, there is no reason for Russia to even pretend it is observing the limits,” he wrote in a post on the organization’s website. “Moscow will be free to deploy the 9M729 cruise missile, and an intermediate-range ballistic missile if it wants, without any restraint.”

In the past, the Obama administration worked to convince Moscow to respect the INF treaty, but made little progress.

“If they get smart and if others get smart and they say ‘let’s not develop these horrible nuclear weapons,’ I would be extremely happy with that, but as long as somebody’s violating the agreement, we’re not going to be the only ones to adhere to it,” Trump said.

Trump: U.S. Will Pull Out of Intermediate-Range Nuke Pact

ELKO, Nevada — President Donald Trump said Saturday he will exit a landmark arms control agreement the United States signed with the former Soviet Union, saying that Russia is violating the pact and it’s preventing the U.S. from developing new weapons.

The 1987 pact, which helps protect the security of the U.S. and its allies in Europe and the Far East, prohibits the United States and Russia from possessing, producing or test-flying a ground-launched cruise missile with a range of 300 to 3,400 miles.

“Russia has violated the agreement. They have been violating it for many years,” Trump said after a rally in Elko, Nevada. “And we’re not going to let them violate a nuclear agreement and go out and do weapons and we’re not allowed to.”

The agreement has constrained the U.S. from developing new weapons, but America will begin developing them unless Russia and China agree not to possess or develop the weapons, Trump said. China is not currently party to the pact.

“We’ll have to develop those weapons, unless Russia comes to us and China comes to us and they all come to us and say let’s really get smart and let’s none of us develop those weapons, but if Russia’s doing it and if China’s doing it, and we’re adhering to the agreement, that’s unacceptable,” he said.

National Security Adviser John Bolton was headed Saturday to Russia, Azerbaijan, Armenia and Georgia. His first stop is Moscow, where he’ll meet with Russian leaders, including Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev. His visit comes at a time when Moscow-Washington relations also remain frosty over the Ukrainian crisis, the war in Syria and allegations of Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential race and upcoming U.S. midterm elections.

There was no immediate comment from the Kremlin or the Russian Foreign Ministry on Trump’s announcement.

Trump didn’t provide details about violations, but in 2017, White House national security officials said Russia had deployed a cruise missile in violation of the treaty. Earlier, the Obama administration accused the Russians of violating the pact by developing and testing a prohibited cruise missile. Russia has repeatedly denied that it has violated the treaty and has accused the United States of not being in compliance.

Defense Secretary James Mattis has previously suggested that a Trump administration proposal to add a sea-launched cruise missile to America’s nuclear arsenal could provide the U.S. with leverage to try to convince Russia to come back in line on the arms treaty.

Russia’s Foreign Ministry said in February that the country would only consider using nuclear weapons in response to an attack involving nuclear or other weapons of mass destruction, or in response to a non-nuclear assault that endangered the survival of the Russian nation.

“We are slowly slipping back to the situation of cold war as it was at the end of the Soviet Union, with quite similar consequences, but now it could be worse because (Russian President Vladimir) Putin belongs to a generation that had no war under its belt,” said Dmitry Oreshkin, an independent Russian political analyst. “These people aren’t as much fearful of a war as people of Brezhnev’s epoch. They think if they threaten the West properly, it gets scared.”

Trump’s decision could be controversial with European allies and others who see value in the treaty, said Steven Pifer, a former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine and now a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution who focuses on nuclear arms control.

“Once the United States withdraws from the treaty, there is no reason for Russia to even pretend it is observing the limits,” he wrote in a post on the organization’s website. “Moscow will be free to deploy the 9M729 cruise missile, and an intermediate-range ballistic missile if it wants, without any restraint.”

U.S. officials have previously alleged that Russia violated the treaty by deliberately deploying a land-based cruise missile in order to pose a threat to NATO. Russia has claimed that U.S. missile defenses violate the pact.

In the past, the Obama administration worked to convince Moscow to respect the INF treaty but made little progress.

“If they get smart and if others get smart and they say let’s not develop these horrible nuclear weapons, I would be extremely happy with that, but as long as somebody’s violating the agreement, we’re not going to be the only ones to adhere to it,” Trump said.

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Balsamo reported from Washington. Associated Press writers Deb Riechmann in Washington and Tanya Titova and James Heintz in Moscow contributed to this report.

Mexico Slowly Processes Caravan Migrants at Guatemala Border

CIUDAD HIDALGO, Mexico — Mexican authorities for a second straight day Saturday refused mass entry to a caravan of Central American migrants held up at the border with Guatemala, but began accepting small groups for asylum processing and gave out some 45-day visitor permits that would theoretically allow recipients time to reach the United States.

Seeking to maintain order after a chaotic Friday in which thousands rushed across the border bridge only to be halted by a phalanx of officers in riot gear, authorities began handing out numbers for people to be processed in a strategy seen before at U.S. border posts when large numbers of migrants show up there.

Once they were processed, migrants were bused to an open-air, metal-roofed fairground in the nearby city of Tapachula, where the Red Cross set up small blue tents on the concrete floor. Easily 3,000 people or more the previous day, the crowd on the bridge thinned out noticeably.

But the slow pace frustrated those stuck on the bridge, where conditions were hot and cramped, and some pleaded at the main gate: “Please let us in, we want to work!” Behind it, workers erected tall steel riot barriers to channel people in an orderly fashion.

Each time a small side gate opened to allow small groups in for processing, there was a crush of bodies as migrants desperately pushed forward.

Scarleth Cruz hoisted a crying, sweat-soaked baby girl above the crowd, crying out: “This girl is suffocating.”

Cruz was among the many who appeared willing to accept any kind of migratory relief Mexico might offer. Cruz, 20, said she was going to ask for political asylum because of threats and repression she faced back in Honduras from President Juan Orlando Hernandez’s governing party.

“Why would I want to go to the United States if I’m going to be persecuted” there as well, she said.

Mexico’s Interior Department said in a statement that it had received 640 refugee requests by Hondurans at the border crossing. It released photos of migrants getting off buses at a shelter and receiving food and medical attention.

At least a half-dozen migrants fainted amid the heat, and a steady stream abandoned the bridge to cross the Suchiate River by swimming, fording its shallows with the aid of ropes or floating in groups of about 10 on rickety rafts. None were visibly detained despite the presence of hundreds of police lining the bridge.

Some migrants tore open a fence on the Guatemala side of the bridge and threw two young children, perhaps age 6 or 7, and their mother into the muddy waters about 40 feet below. They were rafted to safety in on the Mexican bank.

Some on the bank yelled warnings to migrants on the bridge not to get on buses organized by Mexican authorities, claiming it was a ruse to deport them. There was no evidence of anyone being deported through such trickery, but the warnings made plenty leery of boarding, like Fidelina Vasquez, a grandmother traveling with her daughter and 2-year-old grandson.

A Mexican migration official who declined to give his name because he was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly said that between Friday and Saturday, authorities had deported by bus about 500 people who voluntarily decided to return.

Migrants have commonly cited widespread poverty and gang violence in Honduras, one of the world’s deadliest nations by homicide rate, as their reasons for joining the caravan.

“One cannot live back there,” Vasquez said, standing next to the main border gate.

Hector Aguilar, a 49-year-old sales manager who worked as a taxi driver in Honduras’ Yoro province to feed his four children, said he had to pay the two main gangs there protection money in order to work.

“On Thursdays I paid the 18th Street gang, and on Saturdays the MS-13,” Aguilar said. “Three hundred lempiras per day” — about $12.50, a significant amount in low-wage Honduras.

At the gate, Mexican workers handed food and water to the migrants. Through the bars, a doctor gave medical attention to a woman who feared her young son was running a fever.

Some migrants returned to Tecun Uman on the Guatemalan side to buy food and supplies. Local women brought water for the migrants to bathe.

The caravan elicited a series of angry tweets and warnings from U.S. President Donald Trump early in the week, but Mexico’s no-nonsense handling of the migrants at it southern border seems to have satisfied him more recently.

“So as of this moment, I thank Mexico,” Trump said Friday at an event in Scottsdale, Arizona. “I hope they continue. But as of this moment, I thank Mexico. If that doesn’t work out, we’re calling up the military — not the Guard.”

He also warned the migrants that they should turn back.

“They’re not coming into this country,” said Trump, who has sought to make the caravan and border security in general a campaign issue for Republicans ahead of the U.S. midterm elections.

Also Friday, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo met in Mexico City with his Mexican counterpart, Luis Videgaray, with the caravan high on their agenda.

“The Mexican Government is fully engaged in finding a solution that encourages safe, secure, and orderly migration,” State Department Spokeswoman Heather Nauert said Saturday, “and both the United States and Mexico continue to work with Central American governments to address the economic, security, and governance drivers of illegal immigration.”

Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto said late Friday that “Mexico does not permit and will not permit entry into its territory in an irregular fashion, much less in a violent fashion.”

Presidents Hernandez of Honduras and Jimmy Morales of Guatemala held an emergency meeting Saturday at a Guatemalan air base.

The leaders said an estimated 5,400 migrants had entered Guatemala since the caravan was announced a week ago, and about 2,000 Hondurans have returned voluntarily. Both leaders had spoken by phone with Pena Nieto and U.S. Vice President Mike Pence to discuss humanitarian aid and efforts to help people who want to return.

Morales said a Honduran migrant died in the town of Villa Nueva, about 20 miles (30 kilometers) from Guatemala City, when he fell from a truck that was transporting migrants.

Thousands of migrants slept — or tried to sleep — outdoors overnight underneath tarps and what blankets were available. They awoke amid trash and an unpleasant smell, as some had no choice but to relieve themselves in the same area.

Jose Yanez, said he woke up at 5 a.m. with a backache after having nothing to cover himself from the nighttime chill. But the 25-year-old farmer was determined to press onward, explaining that the $6 a day he made back home was not enough to live on.

“From here,” Yanez said, “there’s no going back.”

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Mark Stevenson reported from Ciudad Hidalgo, and Sonia Perez D. reported from Tecun Uman, Guatemala. Associated Press writers Sonny Figueroa in Guatemala City and Peter Orsi in Mexico City contributed to this report.

Violence, Confusion Surround Afghan Parliamentary Elections

KABUL, Afghanistan — Afghanistan’s first parliamentary elections in eight years suffered from violence and chaos Saturday, with a multitude of attacks killing at least 36 people, key election workers failing to show up and many polling stations staying open hours later than scheduled to handle long lines of voters.

Problems surrounding the elections — already three years overdue — threaten to compromise the credibility of polls which an independent monitoring group said were also marred by incidences of ballot stuffing and intimidation by armed men affiliated with candidates in 19 of the country’s 32 provinces. Some areas have yet to vote, including Kandahar, where the provincial police chief was gunned down Thursday.

Stakes were high in these elections for Afghans who hoped to reform Parliament, challenging the dominance of warlords and the politically corrupt and replacing them with a younger, more educated generation of politicians. They were also high for the U.S., which is still seeking an exit strategy after 17 years of a war there that has cost more than $900 billion and claimed more than 2,400 U.S. service personnel.

Deputy Interior Minister Akhtar Mohammed Ibrahimi said 36 people were killed in 193 insurgent attacks across the country: 27 civilians, eight police officers and one Afghan soldier. He said attackers used everything from grenades to small arms fire to mortars and rocket launchers, and that security forces killed 31 insurgents.

The most serious attack on the polls was in a northern Kabul neighborhood where a suicide bomber blew himself up just as voting was about to end, killing three people and wounding another 20, many of them seriously, said Dr. Esa Hashemi, a physician at the nearby Afghan Hospital. Interior and defense ministry officials said 15 people were killed or wounded, including several police.

Polling stations also struggled with voter registration and a new biometric system that was aimed at stemming fraud, but instead created enormous confusion because many of those trained on the system did not show up for work. Also, the biometric machines were received just a month before polls and there was no time to do field testing.

Many polling stations opened as much as five hours behind schedule. The Independent Election Commission was uncertain how many of the estimated 21,000 polling stations closed by 4 p.m. local time, the original closing time. Polling was extended until 8 p.m. local time for all those polling stations that opened late, and those that could not open before 1 p.m. local time will open Sunday.

Afghanistan’s deputy chief executive Mohammad Mohaqiq expressed outrage at the chaotic start to polling and assailed election preparation by the country’s election commission.

“The people rushed like a flood to the polling stations, but the election commission employees were not present, and in some cases they were there but there were no electoral materials and in most cases the biometric systems was not working,” he said.

“The widespread reports today of confusion and incompetence in the administration of the elections … suggest that bureaucratic failures and lack of political will to prioritize organizing credible parliamentary elections may do more to delegitimize the election results than threats and violent attacks by the Taliban and Daesh,” said Andrew Wilder, vice-president of Asia Programs at the U.S. Institute of Peace, using the Arabic acronym name for the Islamic State group.

Afghan President Ashraf Ghani marked his ballot at the start of voting. In a televised speech afterward, he congratulated Afghans on another election and praised the security forces, particularly the air force, for getting ballots to Afghanistan’s remotest corners.

“I thank you from the bottom of my heart,” he said, also reminding those elected that they are there to serve the people and ensure the rule of law.

North of Kabul, thousands of outraged voters blocked a road after waiting more than five hours for a polling station to open, said Mohammad Azim, the governor of Qarabagh district where the demonstration took place.

Election Commission Commissioner Abdul Badi Sayat said dozens of teachers who had been trained in the new biometric system had not shown up for work at the polling stations. It wasn’t clear whether that was related to a Taliban warning directed specifically at teachers and students telling them to stay away from the polls.

“The long lines at many polling stations today, despite the threats and violent attacks by the Taliban and Daesh, clearly demonstrate that the problem with Afghan elections is not the enthusiasm of Afghan voters for a democratic future,” said Wilder.

The Defense Ministry said it had increased its deployment of National Security Forces to 70,000 from the original 50,000 to protect polling stations.

Elections in the provinces of Kandahar and Ghazni have been delayed as well as in 11 of the country’s nearly 400 districts.

The Independent Election Commission registered 8.8 million people. Wasima Badghisy, a commission member, called voters “very, very brave” and said a turnout of 5 million would be a success.

At a polling station in crowded west Kabul, Khoda Baksh said he arrived nearly two hours early to cast his vote, dismissing Taliban threats of violence.

“We don’t care about their threats. The Taliban are threatening us all the time,” said 55-year-old Baksh, who said he wanted to see a new generation of politicians take power in Afghanistan’s 249-seat Parliament. He bemoaned the current Parliament dominated by warlords and corrupt elite. “They have done zero for us.”

In the run-up to the elections, two candidates were killed while polling in Kandahar was delayed for a week after a rogue guard gunned down the powerful provincial police chief, Gen. Abdul Raziq. In the capital of Kabul, security was tight, with police and military personnel stopping vehicles at dozens of checkpoints throughout the congested city.

Commission deputy spokesman Aziz Ibrahimi said results of Saturday’s voting will not be released before mid-November and final results will not be out until later in December.

Trump, Biden Campaign on Opposite Sides of Nev. Senate Race

ELKO, Nev. — Campaigning on opposite sides of a pivotal Senate race, President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden appealed to party loyalists in Nevada as early voting began Saturday in the state.

Wrapping up a three-day visit to Western states with midday rally in rural Elko, Trump lent support for Dean Heller, considered the most vulnerable GOP senator on the Nov. 6 ballot as Republicans hope to retain their Senate majority. The GOP-leaning region of the battleground state is crucial to Trump’s hopes of protecting or expanding Republicans’ 51-49 edge in the Senate.

“If you want to protect America’s laws borders, sovereignty and even your dignity, you need to go out today and vote,” Trump said as he asked supporters to raise their right hands in a pledge to go to the polls.

A short time earlier and 400-plus miles south, Biden headlined a Las Vegas rally at a union local to promote Heller’s challenger, Rep. Jacky Rosen, and other Democratic candidates, as he encouraged Nevada residents to get out and vote.

“This election is literally bigger than politics. It’s bigger than politics,” Biden said. “No matter how old or young you are, you have never participated in an election that is as consequential as this election national and locally.”

Trump struck much the same theme throughout the week, as he has tried to frame the choices for voters in the upcoming election. He has sought to focus on immigration as one of the defining election issues and has falsely accused Democrats of wanting “open borders” and encouraging illegal immigration.

“They’ve gone loco,” Trump said.

Trump referenced Biden’s appearance in Las Vegas, mocking the smaller crowd drawn by his potential 2020 rival, compared with the thousands he gathered on an airport tarmac in the more sparsely populated part of the state.

Trump deployed a refrain he had fine-tuned during his Western swing, declaring that “Democrats produce mobs, Republicans produce jobs.”

“That’s called hashtag,” he said to the crowd. “That’s a new hashtag. That’s a hot one.”

Trump branded Heller’s opponent “Wacky Jacky,” as he sought to cast Rosen as beholden to Democratic coastal elites, including Democratic congressional leaders Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer.

In Las Vegas, Biden criticized Trump for his approach to Russia and President Vladimir Putin, his equivocating on white supremacists in Charlottesville, Va., and his immigration policies, including the separation of migrant families at the U.S.-Mexico border

American values, “are being shredded,” Biden said. “They’re being shredded by a president who is all about himself. It’s all about Donald.”

In a tweet before leaving Arizona, Trump called Heller “a man who has become a good friend” and said he needed the senator’s “Help and Talent in Washington.”

Trump praised Heller for his votes for conservative Supreme Court Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh. The later faced allegations of decades-old sexual assault during his confirmation hearings, prompting impassioned Senate hearings and fraught votes.

“We stuck with Justice Kavanaugh, because he was the right man,” Trump said.

But Heller himself once had rocky relations with Trump and had returned a campaign donation from then-candidate Trump over Trump’s immigration rhetoric. Last year, Trump threatened Heller’s re-election chances when the senator held up GOP efforts to repeal the Obama-era health law. But Heller has since become an ally of the president, who has made two fundraising stops for him in Nevada this year already.

Heller and Rosen held their first and only debate of the campaign on Friday. Heller accused her of making a visit to see separated families at the U.S.-Mexico border in order to stage a “photo-op,” while she described Heller a “rubber-stamp” for Trump, whose tax plan she said benefits the wealthy at the expense of the middle class.

In a further sign of the state’s importance in the midterms, former President Barack Obama scheduled a stop Monday in Las Vegas.

He won Nevada in his 2008 and 2012 campaigns, and Democrat Hillary Clinton carried the state by 2 percentage points over Trump in 2016. But during the last midterm elections in 2014, many Democrats stayed home and Republicans won key races across the state, which has a 29 percent Latino population.

The country’s immigration system has long vexed politicians from both parties, and Republicans themselves have torpedoed near-compromises in recent years. Yet Trump tweeted Saturday that “we could write up and agree to new immigration laws in less than one hour” if Democrats “would stop being obstructionists and come together.”

“Call me,” he told the Democratic leaders in Congress, Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York and Rep. Nancy Pelosi of California. It seemed reminiscent of the time last year when Trump cracked open the door of bipartisanship with those leaders, who emerged from a White House meeting to say Trump had agreed to work toward a deal on protection young immigrants. But no agreement came to pass.

The Biden-Trump circling of one another in the same state happened recently in Kentucky, where Biden campaigned for a Democratic congressional candidate on a Friday night and Trump held a rally the next evening.

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Associated Press writer Michelle L. Price in Las Vegas contributed to this report.

Report: Israeli Cybersecurity Tools Used for Repression Abroad

Israeli cybersecurity companies sold lucrative surveillance systems to countries that then committed human rights violations, according to a report by Haaretz published Friday. The programs were used to prosecute LGBT citizens, detain human rights activists and discriminate against Muslims, according to 100 sources in 15 countries.

Intelligence experts who previously served in the Israel Defense Force’s Unit 8200 went on to take new products to market, according to the report. A sprawling, lucrative, largely unregulated industry, based in the Tel Aviv neighborhood of Herzliya Pituah, sells to foreign governments that then use the products to spy on their citizens’ electronic communications.

According to one source who worked in Latin America for the company Verint, which makes a range of surveillance products: “There was one time that I was teaching people how to collect information from the social networks. I’m working with the trainees and explaining things to them, when suddenly they ask me to run a check on [political] demonstrators. Just like that, in the middle of the training session.”

Israeli equipment has been used to monitor dissidents in South Sudan, Nigeria and Colombia. It was also used to monitor social networks in Angola and Malaysia.

An anonymous source who works in the Israeli cybersecurity field said:

Even when limitations are placed over the capabilities of the computer programs, the companies don’t know who they will be used against. Everyone in this field knows that we are manufacturing systems that invade people’s lives and violate their most basic rights. It’s a weapon—like selling a pistol. The thing is that in this industry, people think about the technological challenges, not about the implications. I want to believe that the Defense Ministry supervises exports in the right way.

“I can’t constrict my client’s capabilities,” another Israeli cybersecurity expert said. “You can’t sell someone a Mercedes and tell him not to drive faster than 100 kilometers an hour. The truth is that the Israeli companies don’t know what use will be made of the systems they sell.”

Saudi Account of Khashoggi Killing Is Widely Denounced

ISTANBUL—Turkey will “never allow a cover-up” of the killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Saudi Arabia’s consulate in Istanbul, a senior official in Turkey’s ruling party said Saturday, reflecting international skepticism over the Saudi account that the writer died during a “fistfight.”

The comment was one of many critical reactions to Saudi Arabia’s announcement of the writer’s violent death, indicating the kingdom’s efforts to defuse a scandal that has gripped the world were falling short. U.S. President Donald Trump, however, was an exception. Asked whether he thought the Saudi explanation was credible, he replied: “I do. I do.”

Despite widespread outrage over the killing of the columnist for The Washington Post, it is unclear to what extent the top leadership of Saudi Arabia, a key U.S. ally and a powerful player in a volatile region, would be held accountable for what human rights activists describe as an extrajudicial killing by Saudi agents.

The only way to find out what happened would be through an international investigation led by a U.N.-appointed panel, the editorial board of The Washington Post said.

Saudi Arabia’s “latest version asks us to believe that Mr. Khashoggi died after becoming engaged in a “brawl” with officials who had been sent to meet him. His body, Saudi officials told several journalists, was handed over to a “local collaborator” for disposal,” it said, while also criticizing Trump for allegedly trying to help top Saudi leaders escape “meaningful accountability.”

Saudi Arabia said 18 Saudi suspects were in custody and intelligence officials had been fired. But critics believe the complex scheme that led to Khashoggi’s death could not have occurred without the knowledge of Mohammed bin Salman, the 33-year-old crown prince whose early promises of sweeping reform are being eclipsed by concerns that he is an impulsive, even sinister figure.

The Saudi narrative of Khashoggi’s death, alleged to have occurred in a brawl following discussions with visiting officials in the consulate, contrasts with Turkish pro-government media reports that a Saudi hit squad, including an autopsy expert, traveled to Istanbul to kill Khashoggi and dispose of his body, which has not yet been found.

“It’s not possible for the Saudi administration to wiggle itself out of this crime if it’s confirmed,” said Numan Kurtulmus, deputy head of Turkey’s Justice and Development Party. He also said Turkey would share its evidence of Khashoggi’s killing with the world and that a “conclusive result” of the investigation is close.

Another Turkish ruling party official also criticized Saudi Arabia, saying the kingdom should have given its explanation “before the situation reached this point.”

The official, Leyla Sahin Usta, said it would have been “more valuable” if Saudi officials had earlier admitted that Khashoggi was killed in its diplomatic post.

Saudi Arabia initially denied any knowledge of the disappearance of Khashoggi, who disappeared after entering its consulate.

The overnight admission that the writer died in the consulate came in Saudi state media more than two weeks after Khashoggi, 59, entered the building for paperwork required to marry his Turkish fiancée and never came out. The kingdom has described assertions in Turkish media leaks, based on purported audio recordings that Khashoggi was tortured, killed and dismembered inside the consulate, as “baseless.”

In firing officials close to Prince Mohammed, Saudi Arabia stopped short of implicating the heir-apparent of the world’s largest oil exporter. King Salman, his father, appointed him to lead a committee that will restructure the kingdom’s intelligence services after Khashoggi’s slaying. No major decisions in Saudi Arabia are made outside of the ultraconservative kingdom’s ruling Al Saud family.

Khashoggi, a prominent journalist and royal court insider for decades in Saudi Arabia, had written columns critical of Prince Mohammed and the kingdom’s direction while living in self-imposed exile in the U.S.

“God have mercy on you my love Jamal, and may you rest in Paradise,” Khashoggi’s fiancée, Hatice Cengiz, tweeted following the Saudi announcements.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres “stresses the need for a prompt, thorough and transparent investigation into the circumstances of Mr. Khashoggi’s death and full accountability for those responsible,” spokesman Stephane Dujarric said.

Standing outside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, the head of a media group said the “authority that gave the orders” in the killing of Khashoggi should be punished.

Turan Kislakci, president of the Turkish Arab Media Association, said Khashoggi was “slaughtered by bloody murderers” and that his group wants “true justice” for its slain colleague.

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said the U.S. will advocate for justice in the Khashoggi case that is “timely, transparent and in accordance with all due process.”

Trump has called the Saudi announcement a “good first step,” but said what happened to Khashoggi was “unacceptable.”

The Saudi announcements about Khashoggi came in statements carried by the state-run Saudi Press Agency early Saturday.

“Preliminary investigations conducted by the Public Prosecution showed that the suspects had traveled to Istanbul to meet with the citizen Jamal Khashoggi as there were indications of the possibility of his returning back to the country,” the statement read. “Discussions took place with the citizen Jamal Khashoggi during his presence in the consulate of the kingdom in Istanbul by the suspects (that) did not go as required and developed in a negative way, leading to a fistfight. The brawl led to his death and their attempt to conceal and hide what happened.”

There’s been no indication Khashoggi had any immediate plans to return to the kingdom.

The Saudi statements, which expressed regret and promised accountability, did not identify the 18 Saudis being held by authorities and did not explain how so many people could have been involved in a fistfight.

The kingdom at the same time announced the firing of four top intelligence officials, including Maj. Gen. Ahmed bin Hassan Assiri, a one-time spokesman for the Saudi military’s campaign in Yemen who later became a confidant of Prince Mohammed.

Saud Qahtani, a powerful adviser to the prince, also was fired. Qahtani had led Saudi efforts to isolate Qatar amid a boycott of the country by the kingdom and three other Arab nations as part of a political dispute.

On Twitter, where Qahtani had launched vitriolic attacks against those he saw as the kingdom’s enemies, he thanked the Saudi government for the opportunity to serve.

“I will remain a loyal servant to my country for all times,” he wrote.

Marchers Clog Streets of London to Demand New Brexit Vote

LONDON—Hundreds of thousands of protesters opposed to Britain’s impending exit from the European Union marched through central London on Saturday, demanding a new referendum and to have a say on the government’s final Brexit deal with the EU.

Organizers say another public vote is needed because new facts have come out about the costs and complexity of Britain’s exit from the bloc since voters chose to leave in 2016.

They estimated that some 700,000 people took part Saturday in the “People’s Vote March,” which saw 150 buses of marchers pour into the British capital from all across the country. Police did not provide an attendance estimate.

“What’s clear is that the only options on the table now from the prime minister are a bad Brexit deal, or no deal whatsoever,” London Mayor Sadiq Khan, who joined the march, told the BBC. “That’s a million miles away from what was promised 2 1/2 years ago.”

Khan said Saturday’s protest was a “march for the future” for young Britons, including those who were too young to vote in Britain’s 2016 Brexit referendum, when those who favored leaving the EU won narrowly by 52 percent.

The mayor, from the opposition Labour Party, has previously backed mounting calls for a fresh referendum so the public can have a say on whether they accept Prime Minister Theresa May’s Brexit deal or choose to stay in the EU.

May, the leader of Britain’s Conservatives, has ruled out another public vote on the subject.

That didn’t stop the crowds on Saturday from demanding one. Among them was “Lord of the Rings” actor Andy Serkis, who marched with his son and wife. Serkis said he believes there should be a second referendum “now that people are more informed.”

Britain is scheduled to leave the EU on March 29, but negotiations over the divorce have been plagued by disagreements, particularly over the future border between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. It will be the U.K.’s only land border with the EU after Brexit, for Ireland is part of the EU and Northern Ireland is part of the U.K.

One of the great accomplishments of the 1998 peace deal that ended decades of violence in Northern Ireland was to dismantle the police and military presence at the border with Ireland. Many on both sides do not want a “hard” border again.

There are also growing fears of a “no-deal” British exit, which could create chaos at the borders and in the EU and the British economies.

May, speaking at an inconclusive EU summit in Brussels this week, said she would consider extending a proposed 21-month post-Brexit transition period for the U.K — one that could keep Britain aligned to EU rules for more than two years after its March departure.

The EU has said extending that period would give more time to strike a trade deal that ensures the Irish border remains friction-free. Pro-Brexit politicians in Britain, however, saw it as an attempt to bind the country to the bloc indefinitely.

“This week’s fresh chaos and confusion over Brexit negotiations has exposed how even the best deal now available will be a bad one for Britain,” said Andrew Adonis, a Labour member of the House of Lords. “Voters will neither forgive nor forget if (lawmakers) allow this miserable Brexit to proceed without people being given the final say.”

For Alaskan Politics, a Week of Surprises

JUNEAU, Alaska — Alaska Gov. Bill Walker dropped his re-election bid shortly after the sudden resignation of his lieutenant governor over what Walker described as an inappropriate overture toward a woman.

Walker’s announcement, made Friday at the Alaska Federation of Natives conference in Anchorage right before he was to participate in a debate, was met with gasps and cries of “No!” from the audience.

“‘Alaska First’ is and cannot be just a campaign slogan,” he said. With less than three weeks until the election, Walker, an independent, said it became clear he could not win a three-way race against Republican former state Sen. Mike Dunleavy and Democratic former U.S. Sen. Mark Begich.

Alaskans deserve a competitive race, “and Alaskans deserve a choice other than Mike Dunleavy,” he said.

Walker, a former Republican and the only independent governor in the country, told reporters he doesn’t agree with Begich on a lot of things. But he said Begich would be better for Alaska than Dunleavy.

On Friday night, Brett Huber, Dunleavy’s campaign manager, issued a statement blasting Walker. “Governor Walker could have chosen a dignified, graceful exit to his campaign. Instead, he opted to bow out with a bitter, partisan attack on Mike Dunleavy. It’s too bad — Alaskans deserve better,” Huber said.

Walker was showered with praise and hugs by conference attendees after his announcement. The debate went on without him. Begich called Walker’s action courageous. Dunleavy did not acknowledge it in his opening statements.

Walker’s campaign was rocked Tuesday by the resignation of Lt. Gov. Byron Mallott, a Democrat who was replaced by former state health commissioner Valerie Davidson.

Throughout the campaign, some Democrats and independents worried that Walker and Begich would split the vote, giving the election to Dunleavy. Walker was elected in 2014 with Democratic support.

Walker’s campaign manager earlier this week said Walker and Begich had been in talks about a “path forward for Alaska” but would not elaborate. On Thursday, they both sought to downplay any suggestions of a potential deal ahead of the Nov. 6 election.

A Division of Elections spokeswoman said ballots have already been printed. Early voting in the state starts Monday.

Casey Steinau, chairwoman of the state Democratic party, lauded Walker for “stepping aside for the greater good.”

Mallott, in a resignation letter, apologized for “inappropriate comments I made that placed a person whom I respect and revere in a position of vulnerability.”

Few details have been released because Walker said he is honoring the wishes of the woman involved.

The partnership of Walker and Mallott — and blurring of partisan lines — was a central theme of their administration and campaign. Walker said he considers Mallott his closest friend and “soul mate.”

In 2014, Walker and Mallott were each running for governor, trying to unseat Republican Gov. Sean Parnell. Walker was a Republican mounting an outsider bid. Mallott was the Democratic candidate and an Alaska Native leader.

With the support of the Democratic party, the two men, who had developed a friendship, combined their campaigns and defeated Parnell. Walker changed his affiliation from Republican to undeclared, and Mallott became Walker’s running mate.

This year, their desire to run together helped seal what some had already seen as an uphill battle for Walker because of the three-way race. Though Democrats now allow independents to run in their primaries, Walker opted against that when it appeared Begich would run. He instead gathered signatures to appear on the general election ballot, which ensured that he and Mallott could run together. Libertarian Billy Toien also is running for governor.

Walker, 67, is no stranger to the underdog role and embraced it through much of the campaign. He often speaks of the emotional and financial toll of rebuilding his hometown of Valdez after a devastating 1964 earthquake. As a kid, he worked odd jobs to help make ends meet and helped his father with his construction business. He said the quake changed him — teaching him lessons about faith, perseverance and working together.

In 2014, oil prices, which had reached around $110 a barrel, began a freefall, bottoming out at $26 a barrel in early 2016. For a state heavily reliant on oil, the impact was severe, creating a multibillion-dollar budget deficit. Alaska fell into a recession.

As governor, Walker faced criticism for halving the size of the check Alaskans received from the state’s oil-wealth fund in 2016. He defends his decision as proper; it came amid legislative gridlock over how to address the deficit. But critics labeled him a thief.

“I ran for the job to do the job, not to keep the job,” he said in a recent interview, describing that and other difficult decisions.