Sexual harassment, assault goes unnoticed at UN: Victims

United Nations: The cases of sexual harassment and assault are rife in the UN offices around the world, with offenders enjoying impunity in a culture of flawed grievance system, a media report said on Friday.

Of the employees interviewed, 15 said they had experienced or reported sexual harassment or assault within the past five years, and alleged offences ranged from verbal harassment to rape, The Guardian reported.

The UN employees said there was a culture of silence across the organisation and a flawed grievance system that is stacked against victims.


The employees said only a few women, who were sexually harassed or assaulted, had formally reported to the grievance cell, but most of the victims do not report for the fear of losing their jobs. There is also a belief that even if they report, no action will be taken.

"If you report it, your career is pretty much over, especially if you're a consultant," the report quoted one consultant as saying. The consultant alleged she was harassed by her supervisor while working for the World Food Programme. "It's like an unsaid thing."

Though the UN Secretary General António Guterres has "prioritised addressing sexual harassment and upholding the zero tolerance policy", the organisation conceded that under-reporting is still a concern they are dealing with.


The report talked to several employees working in more than 10 countries and found that three women who had reported sexual harassment or sexual assault had been forced to quit or threatened with termination of their contracts, while the accused, including a senior UN official, continued to remain in their posts.

"There are no other options to get justice, and I have lost my job too," one of the victims said on the conditions of anonymity.

She said that despite medical evidence and witness testimonies, an internal investigation by the UN found insufficient evidence to support her allegation.


"Along with my job, I lost my visa and spent months in hospital due to stress and trauma," she said.

The internal documents revealed two of the women cite concerns with the investigations, claiming that the UN's investigation's team, the office of internal oversight services (OIOS), failed to interview key witnesses. They also said that transcripts contain errors and information from inquiries has been leaked.

While the accused continue to remain in their senior positions, they also influence the proceedings throughout the investigations, the report said.


"The UN has long been criticised over its failure to properly investigate reports of sexual abuse and exploitation by its peacekeeping forces against local people, not least in Central African Republic and Haiti. Campaigners point to a culture of impunity in UN offices, with accusers routinely silenced," the report mentioned.

Due to the UN's international nature, it becomes difficult for the local people or those within the organisation to pursue complaints. Also, many senior members enjoy diplomatic immunity and, therefore, avoid the national courts. 

After 32 years, FBI relaunches hunt for hijackers of Pan Am Am Flight 73

The FBI has re-launched its search to catch four hijackers of the Pan Am Flight 73.

 Nearly two after the release of Sonam Kapoor's critically acclaimed film 'Neerja', based on the real story of a young Indian flight attendant who died trying to save hundreds of passengers, the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has re-launched its search for the four hijackers of the Pan Am Flight 73.

The biopic, titled “Neerja,” which showcased the story of Neerja Bhanot, a 23-year-old senior flight purser on Pan Am Flight 73 when four armed men hijacked the plane at Karachi airport on September 5, 1986, was released in 2006.

"No matter how much time has passed or the obstacles we encounter, we owe it to the victims and their families to never give up on them," leading Pakistani daily Dawn quoted an FBI agent as saying on Friday.


The attack, which occurred aboard Pan Am Flight 73 during an airport stopover in Karachi on September 5, 1986, resulted in the death of 20 passengers and crew.

The victims included citizens of the US, India, Pakistan, Britain, Italy, Denmark, Ireland and Mexico.

The photos and the sketches of the four suspected hijackers - Wadoud Muhammad Hafiz al-Turki, Jamal Saeed Abdul Rahim, Muhammad Abdullah Khalil Hussain ar-Rahayyal and Muhammad Ahmed al-Munawar – were recently age-progressed by the FBI and released to the media to enable people to identify them.


Since two Americans were among those killed in the failed hijacking attempt, the FBI is legally bound to continue to seek the suspects until they are either brought to the US for trial or their death is confirmed.

Meanwhile, the US State Department has announced a USD 5 million reward for any information leading to their arrest, through its Rewards for Justice Programme.

The four suspects, then believed to be members of terrorist outfit Abu Nidal Organisation, are on the FBI's Most Wanted Terrorists List.


The Pan Am hijacking case is being investigated by the agency's Washington Field Office.

According to the FBI's records, Wadoud Muhammad Hafiz al-Turki was born on June 21, 1955, in Baghdad; Jamal Saeed Abdul Rahim on September 5, 1965, in Lebanon; Muhammad Abdullah Khalil Hussain ar-Rahayyal on November 27, 1965, in Lebanon; and Muhammad Ahmed al-Munawar on May 21, 1965 in Kuwait.

There were 365 and 16 crew members on the Boeing 747-121 when it arrived at the Karachi airport from Mumbai's Sahar International Airport on September 5, 1986.


The Pan American World Airways Flight 73 was preparing to leave Jinnah International Airport for Frankfurt, and then to its final destination, John F Kennedy International Airport, New York, when a group of five hijackers seized the plane.

The leader of the group Zayd Hassan Abd al-Latif Masud al-Safarini, also a Palestinian, was a prominent member of the Abu Nidal group.

The 17-hour long hijacking came to an end when the hijackers opened fire on passengers, causing Pakistani commandos to raid the plane. They freed the aircraft and captured the hijackers.


At a trial held in 1988, all of the convicts admitted to having carried out the hijacking and were given death sentences that were later commuted to life imprisonment.

Safarini was released from prison in Pakistan in 2001 but was arrested a day later by FBI agents in Bangkok on his way to Jordan. In May 2004, a US federal judge in Washington sentenced him to 160 years at Super Max prison in Colorado.

Four other hijackers were released after completing their jail terms and deported to the Palestinian territories. In 2010, news reports claimed that Jamal Saeed Abdul Raheem was killed in a US drone strike on January 9, 2010, in North Waziristan.


The film 'Neerja', made nearly 32 years of the incident, showed how Bhanot helped passengers, including small children and the elderly, escape through the emergency exit, before she was eventually shot dead by one of the gunmen.

According to a citation released by the airline after her death, Bhanot’s “gallant actions were nothing less than heroic” as she along with nearly 400 other passengers and crew members were held hostage for over 16 hours.

Bhanot was awarded the prestigious Ashok Chakra - the country's highest peacetime military award for bravery after her death. 

World's largest underwater cave found in Mexico - See stunning pics

A team of scientists and divers associated with Great Maya Aquifer Project (GAM) have discovered the world's largest flooded cave system in Mexico.

 Mexico City: After several years of intensive exploration, archaeologists and divers in Mexico have discovered the world's largest flooded cave system.

The finding made by a team of scientists and divers associated with Great Maya Aquifer Project (GAM) announced that they have found a passage connecting two underwater caves, creating what they say is the world's largest flooded cave.

The GAM team, committed to studying the mysterious waters of Mexico's Yucatan peninsula, spent years exploring the caves of Sac Actun and Dos Ojos in Tulum before connecting the two caverns together, a CNN report said.

The combined cave will be known as the Sac Actun system, taking on the name of the longer section. The cave stretches across 216 miles.

The Yucatan Peninsula, where the cave is located, reportedly still holds treasures from the ancient Mayan community.

"This immense cave represents the most important submerged archaeological site in the world, as it has more than a hundred archaeological contexts," said GAM director Guillermo de Anda, in a statement,
"Along with this system, we had documented evidence of the first settlers of America, as well as extinct fauna and, of course, the Mayan culture," he added.

''The discovery allows us to appreciate much more clearly how the rituals, the pilgrimage sites and ultimately the great pre-Hispanic settlements that we know emerged," de Anda added.

He called it an "amazing" find that would help us to better understand the Maya civilization.
Until the discovery of the connection between the two caves, the largest underwater cave in the world was the Ox Bel Ha, which stretched 168 miles long, according to the National Speleological Society.

But now, the Sac Actun cave system is the largest known underwater cave on Earth.

Sexual misconduct, harassment thrives at United Nations, claim staff

Dozens of current and former employees from 10 countries were interviewed and described pervasive silence in the organization, where accusers were ignored or feared for their jobs if they spoke out.

Fifteen of those interviewed claimed they had experienced or reported sexual harassment within the past five years, ranging from 'verbal harassment to rape.' Guardian reports that the investigations were mishandled internally in various ways, and the accused men were often allowed to remain at their posts while accusers were 'forced out of their jobs or threatened.'

One consultant, who allegedly was harassed by her supervisor at her job, said, "If you report it, your career is pretty much over, especially if you're a consultant. It's an unsaid thing." Surprisingly, the United Nations has admitted that under-reporting is a concern but observed that it has prioritised addressing sexual harassment and upholding the zero tolerance policy.


Three women who reported sexual harassment or assault told Guardian that after their complaint, they were forced out of their jobs or threatened with the termination of their contract. The alleged perpetrators, however, continued to remain at their posts. Another woman who claimed that she was raped by a more senior UN staff member, said she lost her job despite producing media evidence and witness testimonies.

Seven other alleged victims who spoke to the Guardian were told by an ombudsman or colleague that they should not try to pursue a complaint.

Alleged perpetrators have on the other hand were allowed to remain in senior positions. Four other women, who are still or were UN employees until recently said they were not even given adequate medical care or counselling by the UN.


Many victims and witnesses, who did not pursue formal complaints, said they took the decision out of fear, retaliation. Most of UN employees rely on the organisation for employment and for working visas and other UN benefits. Some agencies have a six-month statute of limitations on complaints.

The United Nations have been severally criticised for the incidents of sexual abuse by its peacekeeping missions in Africa and other parts of the world. But the reports of sexual abuse at its offices have surfaced for the first time in the press.

The United Nations, in its report, too conceded the sexual abuse within the organisation remains a concern. "Data collected system-wide in 2016 indicate that 65 allegations of sexual exploitation and abuse involving civilians were reported, while 80 allegations were made against uniformed personnel. These 145 allegations are associated with at least 311 known victims, the vast majority of whom (309) are women and girls, although there may be more," said organisation in its report.

Researchers recreate the DNA of a man who died nearly 200 years ago from his living descendants rather than his physical remains — something that has never been done before.

Recreating a person’s DNA usually involves some sort of remains, like tissues, to use as a framework. However, a team of scientists have been able to recreate the genome of a man who died in 1827 without leaving any physical evidence by studying samples of those from his family line, reported New Scientist. 

Published in Nature Genetics, the paper recounts how a team of scientists from genome research company deCODE Genetics were able to accomplish this puzzle for the very first time. The team pieced together part of the DNA of Hans Jonatan, an escaped slave who settled in Iceland, married a local woman, and raised a family before dying in 1827, the magazine wrote. 

Scientists tracked down 788 of his descendants and took DNA samples of 182 family members. Some of his family members went back four to five generations. They analyzed the samples against known symbols of African DNA, which helped them re-create about 38 percent of Jonatan’s mother's genome; this would be roughly 19 percent of his own DNA. They also determined that his family likely originated from the African countries of Benin, Cameroon or Nigeria.

The team is clear that they were only able to recreate the DNA due to Iceland’s homogeneity. At the time Jonatan settled, he was the only person of African descent.

“There was no African ancestry in Iceland, apart from Hans Jonatan, prior to around 1920,” study co-author Kári Stefánsson, of deCODE Genetics, told New Scientist.

Because of this circumstance, Jonatan’s DNA was different from other Icelanders, who were of European descent. That allowed scientists to achieve this first-ever accomplishment.

But researchers are skeptical about whether the accomplishment could be replicated because the specific conditions surrounding Jonatan's life are not likely to be found again. Biologist Robin Allaby of the University of Warwick in the United Kingdom explained to Futurism that this success “seems to be the sort of analysis you could only do under particular circumstances when an immigrant genome is of a very rare type.”

But scientists at deCODE believe that this kind of technique could make it possible to re-create DNA of historical figures born after the year 1500.

It’s easy to imagine scary, Black Mirror-like scenarios where this technology is used to further fragment and not better society, but rest assured that scenario isn't likely to happen any time soon. 

Man clears his name 40 years later after googling corrupt police officer who framed him

A man found guilty of stealing mailbags in London in the 1970s has had his name cleared, 43 years later.

Businessman Stephen Simmons, 62, from Dorking, Surrey, was 19 when he was convicted of the theft of the mailbags from Clapham Goods Yard in South London in 1976.

After being found guilty he served eight months in a youth detention centre. 

But Mr Simmons always maintained his innocence.

After taking legal advice from a radio phone-in show five years ago, Mr Simmons Googled the name of the policeman who’d arrested him and discovered the officer had later been convicted for stealing Royal Mail bags and framing people for it.

His case returned to court when the the Criminal Cases Review Commission referred the matter to the Appeal Court last year.

Seaking to the BBC last year, Mr Simmons said he was “100 per cent confident” that he would clear his name.

“I am bitter, absolutely bitter against him.

“I want to let it go, but I can't. Now I'm going to court and can have my day.” 

Mr Simmons was present in court in London on Wednesday when the Court of Appeal overturned his theft convictions.

Lord Chief Justice Lord Burnett announced: “We would wish only to note our regret that it has taken so long for this injustice to be remedied.”

Asked if he was relieved following the ruling, Mr Simmons replied: “I can't tell you how relieved.

"It has only taken 43 years, but I have got there at last.”

Sioux City police arrest two minors for destroying half million bees

 Sioux City police have arrested two male juveniles for alleged vandalism that destroyed more than a half million bees at a Sioux City honey business last month. [Tweet this]

The minors, who were not identified by police, have been charged with three felonies -- criminal mischief in the first degree, agricultural animal facilities offenses and burglary in the third degree, as well as an aggravated misdemeanor, possession of burglars tools.

The juveniles, who are 12 and 13 years old, are accused of destroying all of Wild Hill Honey's hives on Sioux City's west side. The company's losses were estimated at $60,000.

The damage was not covered by insurance. But the public, outraged by the senseless act of vandalism, raised tens of thousands of dollars online for the owners, Justin and Tori Englehardt.

The Englehardts said they plan to rebuild their business, and restock their hives as early as this spring in light of the public's generosity.

Police say they did not anticipate any further arrests.