TODAY'S WORLD NEWS::

• Haj row escalates as Iran and Saudi Arabia miss new deal

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• RIYADH: An Iranian delegation has left Saudi Arabia without an agreement for its citizens to attend the Muslim haj pilgrimage this year, Saudi media have reported, a second failure by the rival Middle East powers to strike a deal.

  Relations between the two countries plummeted after hundreds of Iranians died in a crush during last year's haj and after Riyadh broke diplomatic ties when its Tehran embassy was stormed in January over the Saudi execution of a Shi'ite cleric.

  The dispute has provided another arena for discord between the conservative Sunni Muslim monarchy of Saudi Arabia and the revolutionary Shi'ite republic of Iran, which back opposing sides in Syria and other conflicts across the region.

  "At dawn on Friday, the Iranian mission expressed its desire to leave to home without signing the minutes of arrangements," the official Saudi Press Agency reported late on Friday.

  Iran's top haj official Saeed Ohadi said there was still room to find agreement until Sunday night, according to Tehran's official IRNA news agency.

  Saudi Arabia blamed Iran for the impasse. "We witnessed a lack of seriousness by the Iranian side in dealing with the issue. It is yet another attempt by them to politicize the haj," Abdulmohsen Alyas, an under-secretary at Riyadh's Information Ministry, told Reuters.

  After an earlier attempt to agree on haj terms failed this month, Iran's leadership blamed Saudi Arabia for the delay, saying it was "very concerned" for the safety of Iranian pilgrims after last year's disaster.

  Eight months after the last haj, Saudi Arabia has still not published a report into the disaster, at which it said over 700 pilgrims were killed, the highest death toll at the annual pilgrimage since a crush in 1990.

  However, counts of fatalities in the disaster by countries who received home the bodies of their citizens showed that over 2,000 people may have died in the crush, more than 400 of them Iranians.

   Adding to Tehran's anger, King Salman was later quoted in Saudi state media as praising Saudi authorities for a "successful" haj.

  Saudi Arabia's haj ministry said it had met a number of Iran's concerns, offering electronic visas, a deal on air transport for pilgrims and diplomatic representation by Switzerland for Iranians in Makkah.

• For trans people, family rejection tied to suicide attempts, substance abuse

  
  For transgender or gender non-conforming individuals, as rejection from family members increases, so does their likelihood of suicide attempts or substance abuse, according to a new study.
  "People should understand that families matter," said researcher Sarit Golub, of Hunter College and the Graduate Center of City University of New York (CUNY). "When people are rejected by their loved ones, it can have serious emotional and social consequences."
  Golub and co-author Augustus Klein write in the journal LGBT Health that past research suggests transgender people have increased risks for health problems, including suicide, substance abuse, depression and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), which causes AIDS.
  Among the challenges faced by transgender individuals, they add, are poverty, violence, incarceration and discrimination in housing, employment and healthcare.
  For the new study, Golub and Klein analyzed data from 6,456 U.S. adults ages 18 to 98 who participated in the National Transgender Discrimination Survey in 2008 and 2009.
  Participants were asked if they had ever attempted suicide or ever abused drugs or alcohol to cope with transgender-related discrimination.
  The survey also asked how families reacted to learning that participants were transgender or gender nonconforming. For example, participants were asked if their relationship with their spouse or partner ended, and whether family members chose not to speak or spend time with them.
  About 54 percent of participants experienced a low amount of family rejection, about 31 percent experienced a moderate amount of rejection and about 14 percent experienced a high amount of rejection.
  About 42 percent of participants reported attempting suicide at some point in their lives, and about 26 percent reported abusing drugs or alcohol.
  People who faced a moderate amount of family rejection were about twice as likely to report attempting suicide than those with a low amount of family rejection. Those who experienced a high amount of family rejection were over three times as likely to report a suicide attempt.
  Likewise, the odds of alcohol or drug abuse increased as people experienced more family rejection.
  "For transgender or gender non-conforming individuals, this rejection is based on a failure to accept a fundamental part of that individual’s identity - what they feel to be their core self," Golub told Reuters Health by email. "We are saddened by these findings, and believe they are a call to action for those who work with and care about the transgender community."
  The new study can't prove family rejection causes the increased risk of suicide and substance abuse, however. And the researchers admit that they lack information on the context of family rejection.
  Furthermore, the study findings may not be generalizable to a wider population, because most participants were white, educated and employed.
  "These data are very preliminary, and need to be followed-up by both replication and studies that can help us better understand specific family dynamics that impact the health and wellbeing of transgender individuals," said Klein, who is also a researcher at Hunter College and the Graduate Center of CUNY.
  But understanding the negative role of family rejection is not enough, he added.
  "We want to understand protective factors associated with family acceptance, love and support," he said by email. "Support from close others can often mitigate the negative effects of the structural and institutional discrimination and violence experienced by transgender people."

  Girls code in India to tackle challenges of slum living

  
  MUMBAI: Adolescent girls in the Mumbai slum of Dharavi are battling the daily challenges they face, one mobile app at a time.
  Tutored on laptops donated by friends of Nawneet Ranjan, a filmmaker who set up a charity in Dharavi, the girls are embracing technology to confront issues ranging from their safety to garbage in the sprawling slum in India's biggest city.
  "Girls and women suffer the most in a slum, as they often have no resources and are not aware of their rights," said Ranjan, who studied filmmaking in the United States before returning to Mumbai.
  "I wanted to teach the girls how to use technology to get ahead," he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in a bare room that serves as the classroom. About two dozen girls were seated on the floor, tapping at laptops or reading.
  The girls are building apps they hope will be used by slum dwellers to make their lives easier - by allowing them to send a distress call if a woman is being harassed, a message to civic authorities when garbage needs clearing, or to receive an alert when it's their turn at the communal water tap.
  India is one of the world's largest software services exporters. Global and local technology companies hire tens of thousands of English-speaking college graduates every year at modern campuses in cities such as Bengaluru and Hyderabad.
  The spare room in Dharavi where Roshani, Ansuja, Sapna and Nahek learned to code is a far cry from those glass-and-chrome offices and from global movements such as Girls Who Code and Girls in Tech, aimed at getting more women into technology.
  Ranjan's Dharavi Diary project began with 15 girls. It has grown to more than 200 now, and includes boys and mothers of the children, as well.
  "I like building apps. Knowing how to use a computer, to write code is important for getting a good job," said Ansuja, a slight and articulate 15-year-old.
  "I want to build an app that can help fight child labour, because these are children younger than us and instead of studying, they have to work," she said.
  After school every day, there are lessons in maths, science and arts besides computers, and a game of football most evenings in the playground across the street. During the summer holidays, children stream in and out of the brightly-painted room all day.
  Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has made girls' education one of his priorities, with a nationwide campaign.

  Mexico drug boss Chapo files legal challenge against extradition

  
  MEXICO CITY: Lawyers for Mexican drug boss Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman have filed a legal challenge against a decision by the foreign ministry to approve his extradition to the United States, a newspaper reported on Friday.
  A judge granted him "provisional suspension", meaning that the foreign ministry has 48 hours to present a report justifying its decision, Mexican newspaper El Universal reported.
  Mexico´s Foreign Ministry approved Guzman´s extradition to the United States earlier in May, and said it had received guarantees that the death penalty would not be sought against him.

  Outrage in Malaysia as government backs harsh Islamic law

  
  KUALA LUMPUR: Prime Minister Najib Razak's government in Malaysia threw its support in parliament this week behind an Islamic penal code that includes amputations and stoning, shocking some of his allies and stoking fears of further strains in the multi-ethnic country.
  Critics believe the scandal-tainted prime minister is using 'hudud', the Islamic law, to shore up the backing of Muslim Malay voters and fend off attacks on his leadership ahead of critical by-elections next month and a general election in 2018.
  The government on Thursday unexpectedly submitted to parliament a hudud bill that had been proposed by the Islamist group Parti Islam se-Malaysia's (PAS).
  Although debate on the law was deferred to October by PAS leader Abdul Hadi Awang, its submission to parliament brought criticism from leaders across the political spectrum, including allies of the ruling Barisan Nasional coalition, who represent the ethnic Chinese and Indian communities.
  Najib sought to ease tensions with his allies on Friday, saying the bill was "misunderstood".
  "It's not hudud, but what we refer to as enhanced punishment," he told a news conference after meeting leaders of his ruling United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) party.
  "It applies only to certain offences and this comes under the jurisdiction of the Syariah court and is only applicable to the Muslims. It has nothing to do with non-Muslims."
  He added that the punishments would be limited and canings meted out under the law would not injure or draw blood.
  Earlier in the day, the Malaysian Chinese Association (MCA), a key party in the BN coalition, called the submission of the hudud bill to parliament "unconstitutional".
  "As we repeatedly pointed out, the implementation of Hudud law is against the spirit of the Federal Constitution, and would ruin the inter-ethnic relationship in the country," MCA President Liow Tiong Lai said.
  Arguments for and against the introduction of hudud have divided Malaysia for years. Most of the Southeast Asian country's states implement sharia, the Islamic legal system, but its reach is restricted by federal law.
  Still, the hudud bill appears doomed as the UMNO-led coalition lacks the two-thirds majority needed to pass it into law.
  The Islamist party PAS is pushing for a constitutional amendment that would allow hudud to be implemented in Kelantan, a northern state where nightclubs are banned and there are separate public benches for men and women.
  Many fear such a move would open doors for other states to bring in the Islamic penal code. Hudud stipulates ancient religious punishments for Muslims who violate the law.
  EYEING POLLS
  Critics say that Najib, with an eye on by-elections for two parliamentary seats on June 18, is seeking to appease the majority Muslim votebank with his stand on hudud and to deflect attention from a multi-billion-dollar scandal at the state fund 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB).
  They allege Najib was a beneficiary of 1MDB's funds, after about $680 million was deposited in his bank account before a 2013 election. Najib has denied any wrongdoing.
  Some political heavyweights in Najib's party have questioned whether he can lead them to victory in the 2018 general election. However, he has consolidated power by sacking dissenters within UMNO, which has ruled Malaysia since 1957, and using a controversial and repressive colonial-era sedition law to silence other critics.
  Najib seized on the resounding victory of a coalition partner in a Borneo state election earlier month as evidence that he and his government remain popular. The by-elections in peninsula Malaysia are likely to be a closer contest.
  "Najib did not want the 1MDB global scandal to become the issue in both by-elections," said Lim Kit Siang, parliamentary leader of the Democratic Action Party, adding that Najib has ensured the focus will now be on hudud.

  U.S. forces in Okinawa hold month of mourning for murdered Japanese woman

  
  TOKYO: The U.S. military on Saturday announced a 30-day period of mourning at its bases on the southern Japanese island of Okinawa, where the killing of a woman has reignited resentment of the heavy U.S. military presence in the region.
  A 32-year-old American civilian working at a U.S. military base in Okinawa was arrested this month for dumping the body of the 20-year-old Japanese woman, a procedural step in murder cases.
  The attack stoked anger in Japan, prompting Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to protest about the killing during talks with U.S. President Barack Obama ahead of the Group of Seven summit in central Japan.
  Many associate the bases with crime. The rape of a Japanese schoolgirl by U.S. military personnel in 1995 sparked huge anti-base demonstrations.
  A senior U.S. military official told reporters all festivals, celebrations and music concerts at U.S. military bases would be postponed during the 30-day period which began on Friday.
  Media said alcohol consumption outside bases would be prohibited among military personnel and their families along with civilians employed by the military, while they would also be required to observe a midnight curfew.
  The U.S. military was not immediately available to comment on the details of the restrictions.
  "There are no words in the English language that can adequately convey our level of shock, pain and grief at the loss of life of this innocent victim," said Lt. Gen. Lawrence D. Nicholson, Commander of the U.S. Marine Forces in Japan.
  "We are all shocked, we are all stunned, we are all angry," he said. "My request to the Okinawa people is simple: please do not allow this terrible act of violence to drive a wedge between our two communities."
  Okinawa, the site of a brutal World War Two battle, hosts 50,000 U.S. nationals, including 30,000 military personnel and civilians employed at U.S. bases, and many residents resent what they see as an unfair burden.
  Both governments want to keep the incident from fanning further opposition to an agreement to relocate the U.S. Marines' Futenma air base to a less populous part of Okinawa, a plan first agreed upon after the 1995 rape but opposed by the island's governor and many residents who want the base off the island entirely.

  Florence fines Uffizi Gallery director for ticket tout warning

  
  FLORENCE, Italy: The city of Florence has fined the head of the Uffizi Gallery for broadcasting publicity without authorisation after he aired recording warning visitors not to buy entry to one of the world's most famous art museums from ticket touts.
  Uffizi director Eike Schmidt played the recording of his own voice in English and Italian into the square outside the museum saying where and how much to pay for entry, and telling people to beware of unofficial street vendors and pickpockets.
  City police slapped Schmidt with a 295 euro ($329.78) fine for breaking a law governing audible advertising in the streets. The German art historian said he would pay up on Friday.
  But Schmidt, who took over the job at the home of Botticelli's Birth of Venus last year as part of Italy's campaign to overhaul a sclerotic museum system, criticized the fine.
  "Instead of investing time and energy in working out whether we have made an administrative error with our initiative against ticket touting, we should work together to fight crime and defend our cultural heritage," Schmidt said.
  Tickets to the Uffizi, which also houses Titian's Venus of Urbino, cost up to 12.50 euros, but vendors on the street charge 20-45 euros to skip the queue or have a guided tour.
  Last year, authorities in the capital Rome cracked down on the armies of people who hawk sightseeing tours, rickshaw rides, and photos with centurions around the Colosseum amphitheatre, prompting protests.

  Three current and former US Navy officers charged in bribery case  

  
  WASHINGTON: Three current and former U.S. Navy officers have been charged with participating in an alleged bribery and fraud scheme involving a Singapore-based defense contractor, the US Justice Department said on Friday.
  Retired Navy Captain Michael Brooks, 57, Commander Bobby Pitts, 47, and Lieutenant Commander Gentry Debord, 47, were charged on Wednesday in connection with the case involving Glenn Defense Marine Asia, a company that serviced ships in the Navy's Pacific Fleet, the department said.
  In all, 13 people have been charged in the case and nine have pleaded guilty, including former Glenn Defense Marine Asia (GDMA) Chief Executive Officer Leonard Francis, a Malaysian businessman known as "Fat Leonard." He pleaded guilty last year to bribery charges.
  Brooks and Debord were each charged with one count of conspiracy to commit bribery, and Pitts was charged with one count of conspiracy to defraud the United States and two counts of obstruction of justice, the department said.
  Brooks, Pitts and Debord could not be reached for comment.
  The indictment alleges that Brooks, who served as the U.S. naval attaché at the U.S. Embassy in Manila, used his position to benefit Francis in exchange for travel and entertainment expenses, hotel rooms and the services of prostitutes.
  Pitts, who was officer in charge of the Navy's Fleet Industrial Supply Command, allegedly interfered with the Navy's investigations of Francis's company in exchange for entertainment, meals and the services of a prostitute, according to court documents.
  Debord, who worked in logistics and supply in the western Pacific, allegedly received cash, hotel rooms and the services of prostitutes in exchange for giving Francis information on a Navy investigation into GDMA's billing practices and on competitors' bids, the indictment said.
  Brooks and Pitts made their initial appearances Friday in a U.S. District Court in Virginia and Debord appeared in U.S. District Court in Southern California. All three were granted bond.

  Trump rules out presidential debate with Sanders  

  
  FRESNO, CALIF: US Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump on Friday ruled out a one-on-one debate with second-place Democratic hopeful Bernie Sanders, killing off a potentially high-ratings television spectacle.
  The suggested debate would have sidelined likely Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton but given Sanders a huge platform ahead of California's June 7 primary.
  A day after saying he would welcome a debate with Sanders, Trump called the idea "inappropriate" because as the Republican presumptive nominee he should only face the Democrats' final choice.
  "I will wait to debate the first place finisher in the Democratic Party, probably Crooked Hillary Clinton," Trump said in a statement.
  Sanders’ campaign has been aggressively advocating for a debate with Trump after the idea was raised during an appearance by the New York billionaire on a talk show this week.
  Sanders, a U.S. senator from Vermont, expressed disappointment on Friday.
  "I heard that he was going to debate me, then I heard that he was not going to debate me, then I heard that he was going to debate me. Now you’re telling me that he is not going to debate me. Well, you know, I hope that he changes his mind again," Sanders said in a video clip posted on an ABC News Twitter account.
  Trump suggested broadcast networks were unwilling to go along with his demand that at least $10 million raised from the encounter be donated to charity.
  “I’d love to debate Bernie,” he told a rally in Fresno, California. “But the networks want to keep the money for themselves.”
  Sanders is trailing Clinton in the race to secure their party’s nomination. Opinion polls show he is slicing into Clinton’s lead in California.
  Clinton has shown no interest in debating Sanders before the California primary, which will be part of a final slate of nominating contests. It is possible she will clinch the nomination by winning New Jersey earlier that day, making the outcome in California superfluous.
  The former U.S. secretary of state has said she is looking forward to debating Trump later this year ahead of the Nov. 8 general election.
  Clinton leads Trump by 4 percentage points in the most recent Reuters/Ipsos poll, with their positions with voters basically unchanged since Trump’s support surged two weeks ago. Democrats nationally remain evenly split between Clinton and Sanders.

  More than 2,000 boat migrants rescued off Italy  

  ROME: More than 2,000 migrants were rescued from boats in the Mediterranean on Friday, Italy's coastguard said, as numbers soared for the third year running in the build up to summer.
  Around 14,000 people were taken off often flimsy vessels over the whole week, the United Nations and the coastguard said, and hundreds may have drowned, survivors and boat crews added, though there are no official estimates of casualties.
  Italian Navy ship Vega plucked about 130 people off a "half-submerged" large rubber boat - one of 17 operations coordinated by the coastguard on Friday. There were no details on how many were on board before it deflated.
  The Vega recovered 10 bodies, Ansa news agency said. The coastguard and the navy said they could not confirm the number.
  The coastguard said the warmer weather and calmer seas had led to a surge in the number of people trying to cross from Libya, where people smugglers operate with relative impunity. Numbers managing to reach Italy were comparable to the same period last year and the year before.
  The migrants, many of whom do not know how to swim and do not have life jackets, pay hundreds or thousands of dollars to make the crossing.
  They are piled onto flimsy rubber boats or old fishing vessels, and as dramatic images from the crew of the Italian Navy ship Bettica showed on Wednesday, they can be tossed into the water in a matter of seconds.
  The images show the moment a blue fishing boat capsized, sending hundreds of migrants tumbling into the sea. About 240 women and children had already been rescued, but an unknown number were trapped in the hull. Only five bodies were recovered and 562 were saved.
  Testimony from survivors suggests there were still many people below deck who were not able to escape, according to the U.N. refugee agency, while the Bettica captain estimated that "some 100" may have been lost.
  On Thursday, when 4,000 were rescued in 22 separate operations, survivors from another overturned fishing boat say some 200 may have drowned, a sharp rise from the 20-30 originally estimated, according to an Italian Interior Ministry source. Some 15 bodies were recovered, he said.
  "It's obvious that no matter the great effort made by rescuers, when the numbers are as high as we're seeing this week, it's very risky," said Federico Fossi, a spokesman for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Rome.
  "But in terms of numbers it's the third year that this is 'normal'," Fossi said. "It's the beginning of the high season and we're still at slightly fewer arrivals as the same period last year."
  In 2014 and 2015, more than 320,000 boat migrants arrived on Italian shores, and an estimated 7,000 died in the Mediterranean as they sought to reach Europe, according to the International Organization for Migration.
  On Friday the IOM said it estimates total Mediterranean deaths at sea to be 1,475 this year.

  Turkey says US ´two-faced´ for not viewing Syrian Kurdish YPG as terrorists

  
  ANKARA: The United States is "two-faced" for refusing to call the Syrian Kurdish YPG militia terrorists, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Friday, reflecting Ankara´s growing irritation at Washington´s backing of the group.
  Photos had emerged purportedly showing US Special Forces wearing YPG emblems on their shoulders, something Cavusoglu said was "unacceptable. "A spokesman for the U.S. -led military campaign against Islamic State said the use of the patches was unauthorized and inappropriate, and the soldiers had been asked to remove them.
  "Corrective action has been taken and we have communicated as much to our military partners and our military allies in the
  region," U.S. Army Colonel Steve Warren told reporters.
  NATO member Turkey regards the YPG as an extension of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, which has fought a
  three-decade insurgency for autonomy in Turkey´s largely Kurdish southeast.
  Washington considers the PKK terrorists but backs the Syrian Kurdish militia in the fight against Islamic State. The YPG is the most powerful element of the U.S.-backed Syrian militia alliance involved in an offensive near the Islamic State´s de facto Syrian capital of Raqqa.
  Aided by U.S.-led air strikes, the YPG has driven Islamic State from wide areas of northern Syria over the last year. "If they say ´We don´t see the YPG and these terrorist groups as the same,´ my answer is, that is a double standard and two-faced," Cavusoglu said at a UN summit in Turkey´s Antalya resort.
  "It is unacceptable for U.S. soldiers to use the insignia of the YPG, a terrorist group," he said. Ankara had raised the issue with the State Department.
  The United States does not consider the YPG to be a terrorist group. On Friday, U.S. State Department spokesman Mark Toner
  declined to discuss the photos, saying he did not want to talk about where they were located in Syria.
  "We understand Turkey´s concerns, and let me make that clear," Toner said. "And we continue to discuss this as well as other concerns that Turkey has regarding" Islamic State.
  "Asked at a briefing on Thursday if it was appropriate to wear such insignia, Pentagon press secretary Peter Cook declined
  to comment on the photos but said that when Special Forces operate in some areas, they do what they can to blend in with
  the community to enhance their own security.
  
  
  FROM www.thenews.com.pk