World

HONG KONG — Hong Kong's leader vowed on Monday to "listen humbly" to voters after the pro-democracy camp scored a crushing victory in community-level elections.

Pro-democracy candidates seized an overwhelming majority of the 452 elected seats in the city's 18 district councils, bodies that have historically been firmly in the grip of a Beijing-aligned establishment.

"The government will certainly listen humbly to citizens' opinions and reflect on them seriously," Lam said in a statement issued by the government.

But she gave no specifics on the likely response.

China's foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang said Beijing "resolutely supports" the leader and backs the police and judiciary in Hong Kong in "punishing relevant violent and illegal behaviours".

Opponents quickly called on Lam to accede to a five-point list of demands, including direct elections for the city's legislature and leadership and a probe into alleged police brutality against demonstrators.

"The government must squarely face public opinion," said Wu Chi-wai, the chairman of the Democratic Party, Hong Kong's largest anti-establishment party.

The Labour Party, another leading component of the pro-democracy bloc, attributed the election result to "the sweat, blood and tears" of protesters.

There has been no tear gas fired in Hong Kong for a week. The lull follows some of the most intense clashes yet between police and protesters at the city centre PolyU campus. 

Dozens of newly elected councillors marched on Monday evening on the campus urging police to allow the small number of hardcore protesters who remain holed-up inside to leave freely.

"The people of Hong Kong have spoken," Paul Zimmerman, a pro-democracy councillor re-elected in Sunday's poll, said in a speech outside PolyU. 

"Now is time for the government to respond. Don't fail Hong Kong again."

WASHINGTON — As impeachment hearings play out in Washington, high-level officials, many of them immigrants or children of immigrants, who have testified before Congress are being forced to defend their loyalty to the United States.

Ukrainian-born Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman, a National Security Council expert, rebuffed attacks by proudly stating at the proceedings: "The uniform I wear today is that of the United States Army."

Like many of his peers who have testified, he embodies the "American Dream", as an immigrant who rose to the top.

Having displayed exemplary service to their country, they boast of patriotic gratitude for the United States, which gave them opportunity —  and for some, refuge from oppression.

But that attitude has given them little cover from attack as they participate in the impeachment investigation against Donald Trump, spurred by a phone call in which he asked Ukraine to investigate one of his potential 2020 presidential election opponents.

Vindman, whose family fled anti-Semitism in the Soviet Union to New York when he was just three, has been subject to sharp criticism from the president and his allies.

As a respected member of the White House National Security Council, he testified before the House Intelligence Committee on Tuesday wearing his dress blue uniform displaying his combat infantry badge, campaign ribbons and a Purple Heart received for wounds suffered by a roadside bomb in Iraq.

Following his testimony, which touched on the pressure the president’s cohorts had placed on Kiev, Trump cast doubts on his allegiance.

One guest commentator on the conservative TV channel Fox News even accused him of being a spy for Ukraine.

During the hearing, an attorney for the House Republicans questioned him at length about the fact that a Ukrainian official had offered him the position of minister of defence in Kiev. Vindman explained that he never knew if the offer was serious and immediately declined.

Repeating multiple times that he is an American, he told the Intelligence Committee that “as a young man I decided that I wanted to spend my life serving the nation that gave my family refuge from authoritarian oppression”.

What ‘makes 

America great’ 

Two day later, former national security council expert Fiona Hill, who was Vindman’s superior, echoed the same message.

Almost “everyone immigrated to the United States at some point in their family history. And this is for me what really makes America great”, said Hill who was born in England and became an American “by choice” in 2002.

“This country has offered me opportunities I never would have had in England. I grew up poor with a very distinctive working-class accent. In England in the 1980s and 1990s, this would have impeded my professional advancement,” she said.

She herself has been described by far-right detractors as a “globalist” and “mole” of George Soros, the billionaire philanthropist who is often the subject of anti-Semitic campaigns.

‘It’s very intimidating’ 

Hill joked about the matter but said she was furious that the former ambassador to Kiev, Marie Yovanovitch, who was born in Canada to parents who fled the Soviet and Nazi regimes, suffered such attacks.

Yovanovitch was called back to the United States in May, after a smear campaign orchestrated by Donald Trump’s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani. Her absence, Democrats say, gave Trump and his allies freer rein in the country.

Less than an hour into the hearing, the president erupted spectacularly on Twitter with an attack on the highly regarded former envoy.

Asked what effect Trump’s tweet might have on her and other witnesses, Yovanovitch appeared unnerved.

“It’s very intimidating,” she told the panel, after also speaking of her “gratitude for all that this country has given my family and me”.

US ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland, whose parents fled Nazi Germany first to Uruguay and then to Seattle in the United States, grew up in a family that he said “was eager for freedom and hungry for opportunity”.

In an editorial Will Bunch of the Philadelphia Inquirer called out what he said was a “subliminal theme” running through the proceedings: That immigrants fleeing oppression “became zealous defenders — only to see a dangerous demagogue threaten to drag their country into a muck”.

Adam Schiff, chairman of the Democratic-controlled House committee conducting the impeachment inquiry, said that “the few immigrant stories we’ve heard just in the course of these hearings are among the most powerful I think I’ve ever heard”.

“You and Colonel Vindman and others are the best of this country and you came here by choice and we are so blessed that you did,” he told Hill.

BEIJING — Chinese state media urged Hong Kongers to “vote to end violence” on Sunday, as record numbers turned out for district elections after months of unrest in the city.

Lengthy queues snaked out of polling stations across the semi-autonomus territory in the election for 18 district councils — largely toothless bodies which set policy on issues such as bus routes and garbage collection.

State media on the mainland urged voters to give support to pro-establishment forces to “end social chaos”, but the big turnout is widely expected to benefit democratic forces. 

In a tweet, the nationalistic Global Times asked voters: “What would you choose? A peaceful and prosperous city or a violent uncivilised one?”

“The choice is yours,” the tabloid posted, along with pictures of long polling queues and the text: “Cast vote to end violence”.

An editorial in the Beijing News said it was an opportunity for voters to “end the social chaos and violence in Hong Kong with their own hands, and restore the social order”.

One interviewee told state broadcaster CGTN that turnout was high because voters wanted to end the unrest.

“You can see that there’s a high turnout... because people are very dissatisfied, they feel disgruntled politically with this bunch of rioters,” Lawrence Ma, chairman of the Hong Kong Legal Exchange Foundation, told CGTN.

“So as a result they want to use their vote now, today... so that they can vote out the opposition. I think this is the current sentiment in Hong Kong.”

A bylined commentary in the state-run China Daily called for Hong Kong residents to “save your home by casting votes!” and also urged the electorate to support pro-establishment politicians.

“It is hoped that more Hong Kong residents will go to voting sites and cast their votes in favour of those who truly love Hong Kong,” ran the opinion piece.

In the latest example of state media using music to convey its message, The Global Times also posted rap videos showing shots of Hong Kong clashes and pro-police demonstrations and urged people to: “Go tell ‘em/people want a peaceful place.”

“I can see the sad in your eyes when you blaming a rioter, you just wanna tell him your thoughts and they set you on fire” the rapper said over video footage of a man being set on fire by a masked assailant.

“I know this is a hard time, it’s a tough situation, but you already know, what’s your best decision,” the rap continued.

Earlier this year a music video by a patriotic Chinese rap group shared by Chinese state media also attacked Hong Kong’s pro-democracy movement as being fuelled by international forces.

“Get those foreign agents outta town then we can talk about it,” riffed the English-language rap by nationalistic group CD Rev.

TELFORD, United Kingdom — British Prime Minister Boris Johnson was unveiling his Conservative Party’s manifesto on Sunday, pledging to move on from Brexit and austerity in a bid to secure a general election majority.

Having taken over a minority administration in July and been unable to speed his EU divorce deal through parliament, Johnson is seeking a clear victory at the December 12 snap election.

“We’re now, as you know, less than three weeks away from the most critical election in modern memory,” said Johnson as he unveiled the manifesto in Telford, west central England.

“The choice has never been starker.

“Get Brexit done and we can restore confidence and certainty to businesses and families.

“Get Brexit done and we can focus our hearts and our minds on the priorities of the British people.

“It is time to unleash the potential of the whole country and to forge a new Britain.”

Johnson sees Britain’s third general election in four-and-a-half years as the only way to break the Brexit logjam.

Having got the Brexit date delayed three months from October 31 to January 31, opposition parties backed his call for an early general election.

Johnson is promising to bring back his Brexit deal to parliament before December 25 if the centre-right Conservatives are returned to power.

‘Oven-ready’ Brexit deal 

The main plank of the Conservative manifesto is the Brexit deal Johnson negotiated with Brussels in October. He claims the treaty is “oven-ready” and good to go — as long as he can get a majority.

He insists the deal will allow Britain to regain control over its laws, money and immigration policy.

Johnson’s chief rival, left-wing Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, wants to renegotiate a new, softer Brexit agreement within three months and then put that to a referendum alongside remaining in the EU by the end of June. Corbyn would stay neutral during the process.

Johnson has blasted Corbyn for his strategy in refusing to recommend either his own proposed Brexit deal or staying in the EU.

The Conservative Party is pledging it will not raise the three main taxes — income tax, sales tax and national insurance contributions to state benefits — in what it branded a triple tax lock.

Other measures being unveiled on Sunday include more money for childcare support, energy efficiency measures, skills retraining and road upgrades.

Hospital car parking charges would be axed for certain patients and National Health Service staff.

Poll lead 

The Britain Elects poll aggregator puts the Conservatives on 42 per cent, ahead of the Labour main opposition on 29 per cent, the anti-Brexit Liberal Democrats on 15 per cent, the Brexit Party on 6 per cent and the Greens on 3 per cent.

The Conservatives have seen their popularity surge since Johnson took over from Theresa May four months ago.

Despite the poll advantage, commentators urge caution, mindful that May had a huge percentage lead in the 2017 general election which rapidly melted.

Johnson has his weak spots, especially after the years of austerity imposed by Conservative governments since 2010.

He promises to end the years of reining in the budget deficit by pumping billions of pounds into public services.

Johnson has pledged to make the streets safer by recruiting 20,000 police officers.

He is also committed to increasing the NHS budget by £33.9 billion ($43.5 billion, 39.5 billion euros) by 2023-24, and has pledged to upgrade 20 hospitals and rebuild 40 over the next decade.

Johnson was criticised by members of the public during a televised questions session on Friday over the Conservatives’ handling of the NHS — but he insisted progress could only be made once the Brexit impasse is resolved.

Johnson has announced a three-year plan to increase state-school spending in England by £7.1 billion by 2022-23.

On immigration, he wants to end freedom of movement for EU citizens and introduce an Australian-style points-based system.

The scale of eastern European immigration since 2004 was one of the key factors behind the Brexit referendum vote in 2016.

LA PAZ — Bolivia’s Congress approved a bill on Saturday that opens the door to new elections without ex-president Evo Morales, as the caretaker government met with protesters to end weeks of unrest.

At least 32 people have been killed in violence that erupted after a disputed election on October 20, with protesters’ blockades causing severe fuel and food shortages in La Paz and other cities.

Both houses voted in favor of the proposal after hours-long sessions. It will be sent to interim President Jeanine Anez, who has already said she will sign the bill into law at 14:00 GMT on Sunday.

Among other things, the bill annuls the results of the October 20 vote and allows for new elections to be held.

Crucially, it bars candidates who served in both of the two previous terms from seeking re-election for the same position. That would prevent Morales from contesting the presidency in the new ballot.

Congress also needs to agree on a new seven-member electoral court, after members of the previous panel were removed for allegedly manipulating results.

The tribunal will be tasked with setting a date for the new vote that Anez has previously vowed to hold “as soon as possible”.

“I want to thank our parliamentarians for having understood and listened to the demands of the Bolivian people,” Anez tweeted.

New elections are seen as key to ending Bolivia’s worst political upheaval in 16 years, which has deepened divisions between indigenous people loyal to Morales and Bolivia’s mainly city-dwelling middle and upper classes.

Morales’ Movement for Socialism (MAS) Party holds a majority in both houses of Congress, but is divided over the left-wing leader and his political future.

While some supporters would remain loyal to Morales, members of his party “will try to save MAS without Evo Morales in order to be an option in the next elections”, Carlos Toranzo, a political analyst, told AFP.

Morales, who had been seeking a fourth term, claimed he won last month’s election, but opposition groups said the vote count was rigged.

An audit by the Washington-based Organisation of American States found irregularities in the results.

‘Pacify the country’ 

The congress vote comes a day after the caretaker government filed a criminal complaint accusing Morales — Bolivia’s first indigenous president who served for nearly 14 years — of “sedition and terrorism,” after he allegedly called on supporters to maintain blockades.

If Morales — who fled to Mexico after resigning on November 10 — were to be charged and convicted, he would face a maximum penalty of 30 years in jail.

His former top minister Juan Ramon Quintana, whose whereabouts are unknown, is also accused of the same crimes.

Morales, who claims to have been a victim of a coup after losing the support of the security forces, tweeted on Friday — several hours before Interior Minister Arturo Murillo referred the case to federal prosecutors — that the investigation was based on “planted evidence and manipulated recordings”.

An attempt by MAS senators on Saturday to prohibit “judicial processes” against Morales was rejected outright by Anez, who told reporters that anyone “who has committed crimes, has mocked the law, has committed abuses, will not have any amnesty.”

Two children of Morales — Evaliz Morales Alvarado and Alvaro Morales Peredo — left Bolivia on Saturday and arrived in Argentina after being given the green light by the interim government.

Morales tweeted Saturday that Evaliz had been accused of “illicit enrichment”, which he said was a lie.

Anez, a right-wing senator who declared herself caretaker leader on November 12 after Morales quit, called on anti-government protesters to “let us govern” and lift the road blocks on Friday.

In a potential breakthrough in the crisis, the government announced late Friday that it would meet with various opposition groups at the presidential palace on Saturday.

Meanwhile, the situation began to normalise with fuel supplies reaching some gas stations.

It comes after police on Thursday tear-gassed indigenous protesters who marched on La Paz with the coffins of five of the eight people killed in clashes at a key fuel plant on Tuesday.

The United States has suggested that Morales stay out of upcoming elections, which should be “free, fair and transparent”.

NEW York — They have been viewed as bogus for months, but President Donald Trump and his Republican supporters are giving unprecedented publicity to conspiracy theories as they fight Democratic Party attempts to impeach him.

Analysts say the repetition of debunked claims could have damaging long-term consequences for American democracy, particularly since Democrat supporters are not immune from peddling conspiracy theories of their own.

The Republican conspiracy theories currently centre on Ukraine. They have claimed repeatedly that it was that country — not its neighbour Russia — who interfered in the 2016 US presidential election.

Kiev hacked Hillary Clinton's e-mails, not Russian operatives, the theories go, and it is Ukraine who is in possession of a Democratic National Committee server.

Former National Security Council expert Fiona Hill denounced the theories as a "fictional narrative" advanced by Russia to harm the United States.

"These fictions are harmful even if they are deployed for purely domestic political purposes," she told lawmakers during her testimony on Thursday.

Republicans constantly allege that Trump's potential 2020 challenger Joe Biden may have acted corruptly in Ukraine.

On Tuesday, former US Special Envoy to Ukraine Kurt Volker called that "not credible".

Republicans continue to use them as a mantra anyway.

Devin Nunes, the most senior Republican on the committee that is conducting the impeachment hearings, repeatedly cites them, as does Donald Trump Jr and conservative Fox News anchor Sean Hannity.

Trump himself often relays these long debunked stories to his 67 million Twitter followers.

Tactical 

Conspiracy theories have prospered online for decades, but they are no longer on the sidelines.

Analysts say that the election of Trump has brought them into the highest spheres of public consciousness.

The hearings, broadcast live on television, are testament to that.

Joseph Uscinski, an associate professor of political science at the University of Miami, says other presidents, notably Richard Nixon, have flirted with conspiracy theories but never referenced them so openly.

"Trump seems to be just the opposite, where he's just very forward with these theories and he uses them to motivate people who are sort of outside of the party mainstream."

"He also uses the conspiracy theories to deflect criticism," Uscinski told AFP.

Conspiracy theories are not new. Polls regularly indicate that a majority Americans believe Lee Harvey Oswald was not the only shooter in the November 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy.

Eric Oliver, professor of political science at the University of Chicago, argues that conspiracy theories have spread more widely since the rise of the Christian right in the 1970s.

"These are people often times who have a very intuitionist worldview and by that they sort of really draw on their gut feelings as a guide to what's going on.

"They are also entertaining a lot of supernatural beliefs and apocalyptic beliefs and this type of thinking coincides well within a conspiratorial viewpoint," he said.

Oliver conducted a poll recently in which 18 per cent of respondents said they believed Ukraine tried to manipulate the 2016 vote.

He says fact-checking, which has become very popular in recent years owing to the large amount of information disseminated online, fails to have any impact on Americans with strong beliefs.

"When people often encounter facts that are inconvenient to their prior beliefs, they just simply dismiss the facts and they think about something else," he said.

Long-term damage? 

Uscinski sees similarities among some Democrats, particularly supporters of left-winger Bernie Sanders.

"His entire campaign is built around a conspiracy theory. That the one percent of the richest people control all politics and the entire economy, which isn't true," he said.

For Jonathan Kay, author of "Among the Truthers", a book about the increasing popularity of conspiracy theories in the United States, "It's not a liberal or conservative thing."

"Whoever is jealous of their power or insecure about their power, those are the people that are vulnerable to any conspiracy theory," he told AFP, citing conspiracy theories around the 9/11 attacks which originated on the left.

"It gives people a bridge between what they see and what they believe," he added.

Experts worry about the long-term damage that the popularity and visibility of dubious theories could have on America's democracy.

"Where we see democracies are in trouble is when rational discourse gets undermined by demagogues and conspiracy theories," said Oliver.

Uscinski worries that Trump may base some of his decisions on false theories or indirectly push others to act on them if he doesn't.

Until recently Oliver thought Trump just propagated conspiracy theories for political ends but his repeated calls for Ukraine to investigate Biden has made him think otherwise.

"The president himself seems to be a genuine conspiracy theorist," he said.

BOGOTA — Protesters picketed the home of Colombian President Ivan Duque on Friday, defying a curfew and the leader’s promises of a “national conversation” on social policies following massive anti-government demonstrations that have left three dead and dozens wounded.

“Starting next week, I will launch a national conversation to strengthen the current social policy agenda, working in a united way with medium- and long-term vision, which will allow us to close the social gaps,” Duque has said in a televised speech earlier in the day.

“This conversation will take place regionally with all the social and political sectors. I will use electronic media and participatory mechanisms... so that we can all build a meaningful path of reform.”

The popularity of Duque’s right-wing government — a key ally of the United States — has been on the wane since his election 18 months ago, as it deals with hosting 1.4 million refugees from neighbouring Venezuela’s economic meltdown as well as the complex fallout of a 2016 peace deal with FARC rebels and rampant drug trafficking.

Hundreds of thousands of Colombians took to the streets in Bogota and other cities on Thursday to protest Duque’s economic, social and security policies, as part of a nationwide general strike.

There were arrests and clashes as trade unions, students, opposition parties and the South American country’s indigenous organisations vented their anger.

The protests come amid social upheaval across south America, as a wave of unrest over the past two months has battered governments in Chile, Bolivia and Ecuador.

Duque’s statement on Friday came shortly after Bogota Mayor Enrique Penalosa declared a nighttime curfew in the capital, following clashes between protesters and police in the southern part of the city of seven million earlier in the day.

The president said he was stepping up the police presence and ordering the “deployment of joint patrols of police and army in the most critical places”.

But that didn’t stop hundreds of people from showing up outside the president’s house in Bogota, singing the national anthem while banging pots and pans in a form of protest that is common in parts of Latin America, though not in Colombia.

The protesters dispersed peacefully about one hour after the 9:00pm (02:00 GMT on Saturday) curfew began.

Transport snarled 

Hundreds of demonstrators protested in cities across the country earlier in the day, following protests in the western Valle del Cauca department on Thursday that Defence Minister Carlos Holmes Trujillo told reporters had left three dead.

Penalosa said 76 bus stations were attacked during the violence in Bogota, some of which were totally destroyed, and 79 busses were vandaliased. Some 230 people were arrested, he added.

The violence and looting paralysed the public transport system, forcing hundreds of people to hoof it to their homes or offices.

There were also 122 civilians wounded, 151 security forces hurt and 146 people detained, the government said.

Defence Minister Carlos Holmes Trujillo announced late on Friday that vandalism had been brought under control in Bogota and the curfew was being mostly succesful.

“There is no vandalism at present, the curfew is 90 per cent respected,” he told reporters.

Elsewhere, three police officers were killed and seven other people injured after an attack on a police station in southwestern Colombia on Friday, a local official told AFP.

But city secretary Jaime Asprilla attributed the attack to armed groups in the area, and not to the protests against Duque.

HAWASSA, Ethiopia — Ethiopia's Sidama people have voted overwhelmingly for a new federal region, with 98 per cent choosing autonomous rule, the electoral board said on Saturday.

The result means a major shakeup in Ethiopia, with analysts saying it could inspire other groups to push for autonomy to redraw boundaries in Africa's second most populous country, with more than 100 million people.

The official results were released by Wubshet Ayele, deputy head of the National Electoral Board, in the regional capital Hawassa, roughly 200 kilometres south of Addis Ababa.

"The November 20 polls was peaceful and didn't have major logistical challenges, although in some places there were larger than projected queues of voters," Ayele said.

Less than 2 per cent of the 2.27 million people who voted in the referendum chose to remain in the existing federal region, one of nine currently in Ethiopia, Ayele said.

The poll paves the way for Sidama to become a 10th state — but also acts as inspiration for others keen to carve out their own ethnic region.

With more than 10 other ethnic groups potentially interested in holding their own referendum on autonomy, the Sidama result will have an impact far beyond the local region itself.

Ethnic self-rule 

The referendum on autonomy sprang from a federal system designed to provide widespread ethnic self-rule in a hugely diverse country.

The Sidama — who number more than three million — have agitated for years to leave the diverse Southern Nations, Nationalities, and Peoples' Region.

The Sidama autonomy push gained fresh momentum after Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, winner of this year's Nobel Peace Prize, took office last year and enacted a series of reforms that have encouraged more freedoms.

But his drive to open up Ethiopia's authoritarian one-party state has also unleashed ethnic violence as different groups and regions jostle for power and resources.

The Sidama push for autonomy triggered days of unrest in July that left dozens dead and prompted the government to place Ethiopia's southern region under the control of soldiers and federal police.

There is concern among non-Sidama people in the new state, especially those in the city of Hawassa.

The new state will split off from the old region, and will hand tax-raising powers and control over schools, police, health and other services to the Sidamas, who would be in the majority in the state.

Balancing rights 

Abiy has already congratulated the Sidama people for the "holding a peaceful and democratic" referendum.

"The voting process is demonstrative of our capacity for taking our differences to the ballot and allowing democratic processes to prevail," Abiy said on Thursday.

Creating a new state will be far harder than just voting for one.

Implementing the referendum result is expected to raise a host of thorny issues, and there are a lot of stages ahead before the new state becomes a reality.

"A new region will not be created overnight — this is just one key part of a process," William Davison from the International Crisis Group, said ahead of the result. 

"And during no part of that process should Sidama statehood harm non-Sidama residents or businesses."

LA PAZ — Bolivia's interim President Jeanine Anez asked Congress on Wednesday to approve a law that would allow for new elections, after deadly unrest following the resignation of Evo Morales and the disputed October 20 ballot.

The announcement comes after the number of people killed in clashes with security forces at a fuel plant near La Paz on Tuesday rose to eight, officials said, taking the total death toll since last month's vote to 32.

Morales, who fled to Mexico after resigning November 10, accused the Bolivian security forces of engaging in "genocide" against his indigenous supporters, and called for action by the international community.

The government earlier released an audio recording of a person it alleged to be Morales ordering a member of the opposition movement to continue road blockades around the landlocked country.

For weeks his supporters have been obstructing main roads leading from agricultural regions to La Paz and other major cities, causing severe food and fuel shortages.

Speaking to reporters, Anez said she hoped the caretaker government's proposal — which also seeks the annulment of the original ballot and the formation of a new election tribunal — would form the basis for generating "a national consensus".

Justice Minister Alvaro Coimbra said the hope was for Congress to approve the law "as soon as possible", to allow the selection within 15 days of a new election tribunal, which would be responsible for choosing a date for the ballot.

A similar proposal put forward by Morales' Movement for Socialism (MAS) Party has been sent to a senate commission for analysis.

Anez still has the option to issue a presidential decree for a new vote.

The Washington-based Organisation of American States, which audited last month's elections and found irregularities, on Wednesday approved a resolution calling on Bolivia to "urgently" hold a new vote.

Unrest in Bolivia first erupted after Morales — the country's first indigenous president — was accused of rigging the results of last month's polls to gain reelection.

He resigned and fled to Mexico after losing the support of the security forces.

Anez, the 52-year-old former deputy speaker of the senate, declared herself the country's interim president last week, filling a vacuum left by Morales' departure and the resignations of several ministers.

Since Morales stepped down, his supporters have demonstrated daily in the streets of La Paz and in some provincial cities to demand Anez's departure.

The United Nations, the European Union and the influential Catholic Church have been trying to broker talks between Anez's interim government and opposition parties loyal to Morales to end the violence.

Interior Minister Arturo Murillo played a telephone recording to journalists on Wednesday, allegedly of Morales issuing instructions to a leader of the opposition movement in Bolivia.

"Don't let food into the cities, we're going to block, really encircle [the cities]," says the voice Murillo attributed to Morales.

Morales' order was a "crime against humanity", Murillo told reporters, accusing the ex-president of "terrorism".

"In the coming hours we will file an international lawsuit on this", Murillo said.

Deadly violence 

Speaking to reporters in Mexico on Wednesday, Morales urged the international community to intervene to stop what he called a "genocide" in Bolivia.

"This massacre... is part of a genocide that is happening in our beloved Bolivia", Morales told a press conference in Mexico City.

The deadliest clashes occurred on Friday in the central city of Cochabamba — a stronghold for Morales — where nine people were killed in a confrontation with the army and police.

On Tuesday, deadly violence erupted in El Alto when security forces lifted a siege on a fuel plant that had caused severe shortages in the nearby capital.

The attorney general's office said eight people died in those clashes. The initial death toll had been three, with dozens more wounded.

A spokesman for the ombudsman's office said earlier two of those killed had been hit by gunfire.

The army said in a statement that "agitators and vandals" had attacked and partially destroyed the Senkata fuel plant, "using high-powered explosives".

A convoy of around 50 fuel tankers was able to leave the Senkata plant for the first time in more than a week after police and military forces using armoured vehicles secured the route to neighboring La Paz.

But the defence ministry issued a statement on Wednesday night saying protesters had surrounded the plant again and security forces were protecting it to avoid "any type of attack".

Morales supporters erected barricades around the El Alto plant last week to protest what they said was a coup by Anez.

BANGKOK — Pope Francis met with Thailand's supreme Buddhist patriarch on Thursday in a gilded Bangkok temple on the first full day of his Asia tour aimed at promoting religious harmony

This is the pontiff's first visit to Buddhist-majority Thailand — where just over 0.5 per cent of the population are Catholics — before he jets off to Japan on Saturday.

He is pushing a message of inter-faith peace on a four-day visit that will see him lead a mass later Thursday for tens of thousands of faithful from across southeast Asia.

The 82-year-old head of the Catholic Church also delivered impassioned remarks about the plight of vulnerable children and women who he said deserved a "dignified" future.

In a highly symbolic meeting on Thursday, he sat down with Thailand's supreme Buddhist Patriarch Somdej Phra Maha Muneewong at the Ratchabophit temple in Bangkok's historic old quarter.

"Catholics have enjoyed freedom in religious practice, despite their being in a minority, and for many years have lived in harmony with their Buddhist brothers and sisters," the Pope said in a speech at the meeting.

The pair sat before a brilliant gold Buddha statue inside the ornate temple, built 150 years ago by the former Thai King — the supreme patriarch barefoot and draped in orange robes as they spoke.

The Pope reciprocated the gesture, removing his shoes for part of the tete-a-tete.

In an earlier speech, the Pope said the meeting was "a sign of the importance and urgency of promoting friendship and inter-religious dialogue".

It was the same temple visited by John Paul II on the last papal trip to Thailand in 1984.

This visit coincides with the 350th anniversary of the founding of the "Mission de Siam", marking the first papal mission from Europe in the 17th century.

Though Christianity's first visitors were initially met with scepticism, today Thailand's nearly 400,000 Catholics face little discrimination.

Message for migrants 

The head of the world's 1.3 billion Catholics met with Thailand's Prime Minister Prayut Chan-O-Cha at a red-carpet welcome ceremony at the government guest house, before addressing medical staff at Bangkok's St Louis hospital.

He was accompanied throughout the day by his cousin Sister Ana Rosa, who has lived in Thailand for decades and is helping the pontiff as a translator.

At the hospital, he praised the valuable service "the church offers to the Thai people, especially to those most in need".

Earlier, he made a plea for the women and children "who are wounded, violated and exposed to every form of exploitation, enslavement, violence and abuse", calling for a "dignified future" for the youth.

Trafficking for sexual exploitation is rampant across southeast Asia, and most victims are young girls, according to the United Nations.

He did not miss the opportunity to address the issue of migration, calling for the "safe, orderly, and dignified" movement of people in a region rife with human trafficking.

The risks of illegal journeys abroad were laid bare last month when 39 Vietnamese migrants were found dead in a refrigerated truck in Britain.

"It was heartbreaking; let us all pray for them," the Pope said in a video message about the tragedy to a Vietnamese youth group.

His message came as a Vietnamese Catholic priest was banned from travelling to Japan to attend his mass, after the government cited him as a "national security" threat.

Priest Nguyen Dinh Thuc said he was targeted because he helped troubled fishermen after a 2016 fish kill caused by a toxic dump, accusing authorities of infringing on his right to travel and worship.

Later on Thursday, the Pope will lead a huge mass for tens of thousands of people, including ethnic Karen Christians from northern Thailand and Vietnamese Catholic refugees living in Bangkok.

He will also meet Thailand's King, before kicking off another full day on Friday that will see him greet Catholic leaders and host a second mass.

On Saturday, he flies to Japan, where he will visit Hiroshima and Nagasaki, two cities devastated when the US dropped atomic bombs at the end of World War II in 1945.

The Pope, who years ago had hoped to be a missionary in Japan, has made strong calls for a ban on nuclear weapons.

Since his election six years ago, Francis has made two trips to Asia, visiting the Philippines and Sri Lanka in 2014, followed by Myanmar and Bangladesh in 2017.