【896-900】新西兰禁军用武器&古巴计划大改革&枪击事件影响到新西兰孟加拉社区&美国加大封锁华为&坦桑尼亚妇女足球技养家
AS IT IS
Tanzanian Woman Feeds Family with Soccer Ball Skills
A Tanzanian woman is travelling around Africa demonstrating her soccer ball skills as a way to feed her family.
Her name is Hadhara Charles Mjeje. Short videos of her in action have received a lot of attention on social media. Last month, one of her videos even caught the attention of United States President Donald Trump. He wrote on the website Twitter, “Amazing!”
Mjeje started working on her ball movement, or juggling, skills when she was growing up in Tanzania. For many years, she played for a local women’s soccer team.
Mjeje hits the ball with her feet, head and upper body, but not her hands.
Mjeje is a 29-year-old single mother of two boys. For the past six years, she has been using her special juggling skills to help her support them.
She asks for $4 for a two-minute performance. She earns between $45 and $50 a day. She says the money goes toward sending her children to school and buying food for them to eat.
So far, Mjeje has traveled to Cameroon, Burundi, Gabon and Malawi to give her performances.
At a recent show in Malawai, she told VOA, “There is no magic in this ball. This is my own talent I started developing long ago.”
In Malawi, her skill got the attention of the country’s National Women’s Football officials. They were interested in bringing her into their women’s soccer development program. Mjeje turned down the offer.
Sugzo Ngwira is the head of the Women’s Football Committee in Central Malawi. She said that if Mjeje were ready to use her skills with other players, her organization would explore ways of working with Mjeje.
Mjeje’s skills have caught the interest of male soccer players, too. Samuel Zeka plays social football in Malawi’s capital, Lilongwe. He says it is a rare talent for women to juggle the ball as well as she does.
“I would be very grateful if she would teach me such skills,” Zeka added.
Mjeje said she wished the American president could have done more to help her than write a supportive message on Twitter. She said she wished Trump had offered to help feed her family. Along with her children, she also has her aging parents to care for.
But Trump’s reaction on Twitter did lead to extra attention. Shortly after, she received requests for interviews from local and international news agencies, including the BBC and Reuters.
She returned to Tanzania in early March, after an agent traveled to Malawi to meet her. The agent wanted to share the possibility of signing an advertising contract that could earn her a lot of money in Spain.
Mjeje said she hopes the new contract marks the beginning of a better life.
I’m Pete Musto.
Lameck Masina reported this story for VOA. Pete Musto adapted it for Learning English. Ashley Thompson was the editor.
We want to hear from you. What kinds of special skills do you have that you think might make you some money? Write to us in the Comments Section or on our Facebook page.
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Words in This Story
social media – n. forms of electronic communication, such as website, through which people create online communities to share information, ideas and personal messages
talent – n. a special ability that allows someone to do something well
grateful – adj. feeling or showing thanks to someone for some helpful act
interview(s) – n. a meeting between a reporter and another person in order to get information for a news story
agent – n. a person who does business for another person
AS IT IS
US Wages Wide-Ranging Campaign to Block Huawei
FILE - A staff member stands in front of a Huawei shop in Beijing, China, March 7, 2019.
The United States has launched a campaign against the Chinese telecommunications company Huawei Technologies.
The U.S. government wants to prevent Huawei from competing internationally in the launch of 5G mobile networking technology. 5G is the latest version of cellular technology. It is designed to increase the speed of wireless communications.
U.S. officials have accused Huawei of working with Chinese intelligence services. The company denies the accusation.
The U.S. effort has included officials from federal government agencies as well as President Donald Trump. The Trump administration has taken steps to contain Huawei’s ability to operate within the United States. It has begun an unusual effort to persuade U.S. allies to bar the company from operating on their soil.
Huawei has long been distrusted in some areas. The company has a documented history of industrial spying. Its competitiveness in the world has been helped by financial assistance from China’s government.
“Huawei has been accused of many things for a very long time. This is nothing new,” said Michael Murphree. He is with the University of South Carolina’s Darla Moore School of Business.
“What is unique is the extent of the pressure campaign,” Murphree added. For “international technology competition, this is certainly a very strong effort against a specific firm.”
The effort to stop Huawei from playing a major part in the launch of 5G comes while U.S. and Chinese officials are in talks to end a trade war. The United States began the trade war last year when it ordered tariffs on hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of Chinese exports.
A spokesman for Huawei would not comment on the actions of the Trump Administration.
The case against Huawei
U.S. officials say they have many reasons to distrust Huawei.
Since 2017, China has had a National Intelligence law that gives government intelligence services the power to demand the cooperation of businesses operating in China. U.S. officials argue that this creates a threat to American national security.
“In America, we can’t even get Apple to…open an iPhone for the FBI,” Florida Senator Marco Rubio said earlier this month. “In China, Huawei has to give the Chinese anything they ask for.” He added, “They should not be in business in America.”
Huawei has strongly denied that it operates as part of Chinese intelligence. But two recent spying cases have involved people close to the company.
In January, the Polish government arrested a Huawei official on charges of spying for China. The company itself has not been charged in the case. Huawei announced that the employee had been dismissed.
The United States has one major concern about Huawei: the idea that the company could set up a secret way to gain entry to electronic devices. The equipment would enable the Chinese government to read sensitive communications. It might even give China power to suspend communications in another country.
Ren Zhengfei, is Huawei’s president and founder. He has said China’s government would never make that request and, if it did, he would say ‘no,’ he told the BBC. He added “we (would) lose all our business. I’m not going to take that risk.”
The public battle over Huawei's image
The U.S. government’s anti-Huawei campaign has developed on several fronts.
There are accusations against Huawei’s Chief Financial Officer, Meng Wanzhou. She is being held in Canada at the request of U.S. officials who say she violated American sanctions against Iran. The U.S. justice department wants her sent to New York to face legal action.
There are separate federal charges that accuse the company of stealing trade secrets. President Trump has suggested he might use the charges against Meng to influence the trade talks.
There have also been active efforts to persuade other countries to avoid business with Huawei.
Last month, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo gave a warning to U.S. allies. He said that if they use Huawei telecom equipment, they will lose access to some intelligence collected by the United States.
In addition, a law signed by President Trump last year bars the federal government from buying equipment from Huawei and a smaller Chinese telecom company, ZTE. Trump has additionally considered an executive order that would bar Huawei from taking part at all in U.S. 5G networks.
Huawei is fighting back. It took the United States to court earlier this month. The case claims the company was unfairly banned from U.S. government computer networks. The lawsuit is likely also partly aimed at improving Huawei's image at a time when the company is under attack.
The risk of pushback from China
Some U.S. allies are showing real resistance to the American demands. German Chancellor Angela Merkel's reaction to the U.S. was simply that Germans would be "defining our standards for ourselves," The New York Times reported.
Finally, there is always the possibility that China may take action against countries that follow the U.S. requests. And in China, that kind of action would likely have a lot of public support.
Many Chinese believe that Huawei is a great company that has done extraordinary things…and it is being unfairly treated, said Lester Ross of the U.S. law firm Wilmer Hale.
VOA’s Rob Garver reported this story. Susan Shand adapted it for VOA Learning English. George Grow was the editor.
Write to us in the Comments Section or on our Facebook page.
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Words in This Story
unique - adj. very special or unusual
firm - n. a company or business
tariffs - n. a tax on goods that are imported or exported
FBI - n. The United States' Federal Bureau of Investigation
sanctions - n. an action that is taken or an order that is given to force a country to obey international laws by limiting or stopping trade with that country, by not allowing economic aid for that country
access - n. a way of getting near, at, or to something or someone
standard - n. a level of quality, achievement, etc., that is considered acceptable or desirable
AS IT IS
Mosque Shootings Affect New Zealand's Bangladeshi Community
Al Noor mosque shooting survivor Farhid Ahmed holds a picture of his wife Husna, who was killed in the attack, after an interview with Reuters in Christchurch, New Zealand March 18, 2019. Picture taken March 18, 2019. REUTERS/Edgar Su
Nineteen-year-old Husna Ahmed arrived in New Zealand from Bangladesh on her wedding day. Her future husband, Farid, was waiting to meet her. They married a few hours after that, as their families had agreed.
Twenty-five years later, the life they had built together was torn apart at the Al Noor mosque in Christchurch. A gunman walked into the building and fired on worshippers last Friday as they were praying.
Husna came across the gunman as he was coming out of the mosque. The gunman shot her on the footpath. After she fell, he fired two more shots and killed her.
Farid was talking to a friend and was delayed in joining worshippers at his usual place at the front of the mosque. Instead, he prayed in a small side room.
Farid was able to escape when he heard the shooting begin. When the gunman left, he returned to find many of his friends and community members dead. He provided comfort to those who were dying.
He found out about his wife’s death when a police official he knew called another family member as they waited outside the mosque.
A total of 50 people were killed in the attack at Al Noor and another mosque in Christchurch.
Most victims were migrants or refugees from countries including Pakistan, India, Malaysia, Syria, Turkey, Somalia and Afghanistan.
Shafiqur Rahman Bhuiyan is a Bangladeshi diplomat in New Zealand. He told the Reuters news service that Husna was one of five members of a growing but closely connected Bangladeshi community killed. He added that four others were wounded.
Members of the Bangladesh cricket team, which was in town for a test match against New Zealand, narrowly avoided harm. They arrived at the Al Noor mosque just after the shooting took place.
Witnesses of the attack told Farid that Husna, instead of hiding, helped other women and children inside the mosque. She also ran to the front of the building to look for Farid.
Farid said, “She’s such a person who always put other people first and she was even not afraid to give her life saving other people.”
People in Christchurch and all over New Zealand are deeply saddened by the attack.
Farid said he has forgiven his wife’s killer.
He said, “I want to give the message to the person who did this, or if he has any friends who also think like this: I still love you. I want to hug you and I want to tell him…that I am talking from my heart. I never hated you, I will never hate you.”
Like a mother
A few hours after the violence, the front room of Farid’s home near Christchurch was filled with survivors and friends. Many described Husna as being like a mother to them.
At the time of Husna’s arrival in New Zealand, there were almost no other Bangladeshis in the small city of Nelson, where the couple first lived. But Husna made English-speaking friends, and was able to learn the language in six months. Farid said she spoke English with more of a New Zealand accent than he did.
Farid’s coworkers at a meat-packing plant agreed to work 30 minutes longer on Fridays so he could take time to pray. To thank them, Husna cooked a large meal every week.
Four years into their marriage, Farid was partly paralyzed after being run over by a car outside his house. After that, the couple moved to Christchurch and Husna became his nurse.
“Our hobby was we used to talk to each other. A lot. And we never felt bored,” he said.
I’m Jonathan Evans.
Charlotte Greenfield and Tom Westbrook reported this story for the Reuters news service. Jonathan Evans adapted it for Learning English. Ashley Thompson was the editor.
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Words in This Story
accent – n. a way of pronouncing words that occurs among the people in a particular region or country
cricket - n. a game played on a large field by two teams of 11 players who try to score runs by hitting a small ball with a bat and then running between two sets of wooden sticks
paralyze - v. to make (a person or animal) unable to move or feel all or part of the body
bored – adj. tired and annoyed by being uninteresting or too much the same
hobby – n. an activity that a person does for pleasure when not working
mosque – n. a building that is used for Muslim religious services
AS IT IS
Cuba Planning Major Changes to State and Legal System
Cuba's President Miguel Diaz-Canel talks to the press after voting in a referendum to approve or reject the new constitution in Havana, Cuba, Sunday, Feb. 24, 2019.
The Cuban government is set to launch major changes to its centrally planned, single-party political system. The new laws could reshape everything from criminal justice to the economy.
Nearly a year of debate and discussion ended last month with the approval of Cuba’s first constitutional reform since 1976.
Some observers see the new constitution as making minor changes, but nothing substantive. They say the new constitution is aimed at ensuring that one of the world’s last communist systems does not get any serious reforms for years to come.
But others see the possibility for a slow-moving but deep change that will speed the modernization of Cuba’s government.
Cuban legal experts say they expect the government to send the National Assembly between 60 and 80 proposed laws over the next two years. They told The Associated Press that these measures, when approved, would replace laws considered outdated.
The assembly is almost sure to approve all government proposals, as it has for years.
“I expect to see big changes in Cuba with the new constitution,” said Julio Antonio Fernandez, a law professor at the University of Havana. “A new state structure, a transformed political system, led by the Communist Party, of course, but different and confronting big challenges,” he added.
One of the first changes will be in Cuba’s political system. In the next five months, the government is required to pass a new electoral law. The measure would split the duties of head of state and government between the current president and a new position of prime minister.
Also, new governors will replace the Communist Party first secretaries as the highest official in Cuba’s 15 provinces.
The Communist Party remains the only political group permitted in the country. However, the wording in the new constitution could give voters a choice among different Communist Party candidates instead of just voting “yes” or “no” for a single candidate chosen by the government.
A new business law could create an official role or position for small- and medium-sized businesses. Until now, all private workers and employers are legally defined as “self-employed.” This means hundreds of thousands of “self-employed” Cubans go to work each day for the “self-employed” owners of restaurants and family-operated hotels.
Business owners hope legal recognition will bring them new rights, including the ability to import and export. Such rights currently only exist for state-controlled businesses.
A new family code is expected to deal with the issue of same sex marriage, which was struck from the new constitution after popular resistance.
A new criminal code will, for the first time, require the government to fully explain a citizen’s detention. It will also give Cubans the right to know what information the government holds about them.
Experts say the changes to criminal law could also include stronger measures against family violence, and greater environmental protections and animal rights. The changes could also create stronger punishments for corruption and wrongdoing by government officials.
Cuba’s powerful military and intelligence ministries employ tens of thousands of agents and informants. They control much of the economy. And they are often thought to be outside of the rules that apply to the civilian parts of the government. It is not yet known whether the Interior Ministry and Revolutionary Armed Forces will be subject to the new limits in the legal reform.
Cuba is in its fourth year of little or no economic growth. The government feels increasingly threatened by the United States. It is especially concerned over the U.S. support for the overthrow of Venezuela’s Cuban-allied government. Cuba sees such efforts as the first step in an offensive against socialist governments across Latin America.
I’m Ashley Thompson.
The Associated Press reported this story. Ashley Thompson adapted it for VOA Learning English. George Grow was the editor.
Words in This Story
confront - v. to deal with (something) in an honest and direct way
challenge - n. a difficult task or problem : something that is hard to do
province - n. any one of the large parts that some countries are divided into
apply - v. to have an effect on someone or something
code - n. a set of laws or regulations
AS IT IS
New Zealand Bans 'Military-Style Weapons after Christchurch Attack
Mourners arrive for a burial service of a victim from the March 15 mosque shootings at the Memorial Park Cemetery in Christchurch, New Zealand, Thursday, March 21, 2019. (AP Photo/Vincent Thian)
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern on Thursday announced a ban of “military-style semi-automatic” weapons. The ban comes just six days after the mass shootings at two Islamic religious centers in the city of Christchurch. Fifty people died in the attacks.
Ardern said New Zealanders could turn in their guns while officials develop a buyback program. The program could cost the government as much as $140 million.
The ban includes all semi-automatic weapons and shotguns that can be used with removable magazines that hold more than five rounds of bullets.
Ardern said the man charged in the mosque attacks used 30-round magazines that he bought “easily through a simple online purchase.”
The prime minister added, “Every semi-automatic weapon used in the terrorist attack on Friday will be banned.”
The ban does not include smaller guns or shotguns with non-removable magazines, which are commonly used among farmers and hunters in New Zealand. There are nearly 250,000 licensed gun owners in New Zealand, a country of 5 million people.
Police and military members will not be affected by the ban. Access to such weapons for use during international shooting competitions would be considered.
After Ardern’s announcement, one of New Zealand’s largest gun sellers, Hunting & Fishing New Zealand, repeated its support of “any government measure to permanently ban such weapons.”
Its chief executive, Darren Jacobs, said in a statement, “Last week’s events have forced a reconsideration that has led us to believe such weapons of war have no place in our business — or our country.”
Even without the ban, Jacobs said the company would no longer sell any assault-style weapons of any kind. The company also plans to stop selling weapons online.
Polly Collins of Christchurch praised the quick action from the prime minister. She told the Associated Press, “It’s not like in America, where they have all these things and then they go ‘Oh yeah, we’ll deal with the gun laws,’ and nothing’s done.”
Last March, Americans turned out in large numbers to demand stronger gun control measures after the shooting in Parkland, Florida that left 17 people dead. The call for gun control was similar to others that happened after every mass shooting in the United States.
Gun-rights supporters in America note that gun ownership is protected under the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
Around the world, some countries have taken measures to limit the sale of guns after deadly incidents.
Australia
After 35 people were killed in a mass shooting in Australia’s Tasmania in 1996, the federal government passed a law banning all automatic and semiautomatic weapons.
The government also spent hundreds of millions of dollars to buy back more than 650,000 weapons. Some experts have credited the measures for reduced gun deaths and violence in that country.
Japan
Japan has some of the strictest gun laws and among the lowest homicide rates in the world. Japanese laws only permit shotguns and air rifles. Weapons are also permitted for research and use in competitions.
If someone in Japan wants to own a gun, they must attend a class and pass a written exam and shooting test. They also must pass a mental health examination and a background check. The gun owners must then repeat that process every three years.
Norway
The Small Arms Survey reports that Norway has a high rate of gun ownership but a low rate of homicide. Norwegian police do not carry weapons.
Gun control was not a major issue in Norway until the 2011 mass shooting at a summer camp that killed 77 people. After the shooting, an independent group proposed tighter gun laws. However, no changes were made.
Britain
In 1987, a gunman armed with semiautomatic weapons and a handgun shot and killed 16 people in a small town west of London. The incident led to Britain passing new laws that banned semiautomatic weapons and required shotgun owners to register their weapons.
An even stricter gun law was passed after the shooting death of 16 schoolchildren and one adult in 1996. The shooting in Dunblane led to the ban of handguns and a $200-million gun buyback program.
I'm Jonathan Evans.
Hai Do adapted this story for Learning English based on information from the Associated Press, the World Economic Forum and the Council on Foreign relations. Ashley Thompson was the editor.
Write to us in the Comments Section or on our Facebook page.
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Words in This Story
magazine - n. a part of a gun that holds bullets
mosque - n. a building that is used for Muslim religious services
licensed - adj. having official permission or license
access - n. permission or the right to use something
homicide - n. the act of killing another person
background - n. information, experiences, .. in a person's past