Syrian troops advance on rebel enclave
Compiled from news services
BEIRUT — Syrian government forces seized vast swaths of territory including farmland in the oppositionheld suburbs of Damascus on Wednesday, effectively dividing the besieged enclave in two and further squeezing rebels and tens of thousands of civilians trapped inside, state media and a war monitor reported.
The government, determined to wrest the eastern Ghouta suburbs from the control of rebels after seven years of war, has resorted to extreme levels of shelling and bombardment to clear the way for its troops to advance on the ground. At least 800 civilians have been killed in the past two weeks, including dozens reported Wednesday, according to the Syrian Observatory of Human Rights monitoring group.
In Geneva, U.N. human rights chief Zeid Ra’ad alHussein denounced what he said were attempts by Syria’s government to justify indiscriminate, brutal attacks on hundreds of thousands of civilians by the need to combat a few hundred fighters in eastern Ghouta, calling it “legally and morally unsustainable.”
Paul VI, Romero canonized
ROME— Pope Francis has paved the way for the canonization of Pope Paul VI, who led the Roman Catholic Church through turmoil in the 1960s and ‘70s, and the slain Salvadoran Archbishop Óscar Romero, the Vatican announced Wednesday.
Francis approved the decrees Tuesday confirming miracles attributed to the intercession of the former pontiff and the Salvadoran archbishop, the Holy See said in a statement.
The miracle attributed to Paul VI involves the healing of a seriously ill fetus, according to the Diocese of Brescia, where the pope was born. In the case of Archbishop Romero, the nature of the miracle has not been made public, but Vatican journalists have speculated that it concerned a woman whose pregnancy presented serious risks for her and her baby, and who healed inexplicably.
The approval of the miracles was the last step required for Paul VI and Archbishop Romero to be canonized. No dates for the canonizations have officially been set.
Suu Kyi loses award
WASHINGTON— The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum said Wednesday that it is rescinding the Elie Wiesel Award — its highest honor — it gave in 2012 to Aung San Suu Kyi, the Myanmar political leader and Nobel laureate, saying military crimes against the Muslim Rohingya minority “demand that you use your moral authority to address this situation.”
The announcement, posted on the museum’s website, comes as calls are becoming louder and louder for Ms. Suu Kyi, once a towering human rights hero, to speak out. She is seen as the power behind President Htin Kyaw, a close friend and ally. Prevented by Myanmar’s law from running for political office, she holds the title of state counselor and foreign minister.
Tillerson’s Africa trip
ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia — Secretary of State Rex Tillerson arrived in Ethiopia on Wednesday at the start of a week-long trip that comes amid a sense on the continent that President Donald Trump’s administration is simply uninterested in Africa.
Mr. Tillerson will visit Ethiopia, Djibouti, Kenya, Chad and Nigeria, even as many top posts for the continent in the State Department remain unfilled and little has been said of the administration’s priorities for the continent.