In a video intended for children to mark the Christian holiday, a white actor playing the role of King Balthazar wore black makeup and spoke with grammatical errors. Critics called the video "disgusting." The mayor's office in Madrid has apologized for distributing videos for the holiday of Epiphany that featured a white actor wearing blackface. The videos showed King Balthazar, one of the legendary Three Wise Men from the Bible, depicted by a white man wearing thick black makeup. Early Christian texts describe Balthazar as African, and Renaissance paintings often depict him as Black.   In the video, the man addressed children watching and promised them lots of presents while putting on a fake foreign accent and speaking with grammatical errors. "It is obviously not the right person to feature in these videos. It's a regrettable mistake on the part of the company charged with this activity," Madrid's deputy mayor, Maria Inmaculada Sanz Otero, told reporters after the video made news headlines. The video production company apologized for any offense caused and said it had not intended to ridicule anyone but instead tried to portray Balthazar in a "believable way" for the children.   Activists and politicians condemn video The video, which city hall said had been distributed to 20-30 families upon request, attracted criticism in Spain. Anti-racism platform Afrofeminas called the video "disgusting." "Normalizing these tendencies leads to things that shouldn't be tolerated in the 21st century still happening in Spain," said the group's founder, Antoinette Torres. She pointed to an incident last year when football fans hung an effigy of Black Real Madrid player Vinicius Jr from a bridge. Eduardo Rubino of the left-wing Mas Madrid party also described the actor's affected accent as "pathetic" and "pure racism." "It's incredible that among the 120,000 residents of Madrid who are of African descent, they were unable to find a single one who can play the role of Balthazar," he said. The depiction of Balthazar by white people in blackface is part of a wider Epiphany tradition in Spain that includes annual parades on January 5.   Rita Bosaho, who was the first Black woman in Spain's parliament and led the Equality Ministry's racial diversity department from 2020 to 2023, said the tradition tarnishes the memory of enslaved people and disempowers Black children in Spain. "It sends a message that racism, that our skin doesn't matter," she said.  

'Boithok', a government's video conferencing platform, will now be expanded to public offices across the country to hold virtual meetings aimed at securing official conversations and communications.   "The government is going to extend the usage of 'Boithok' at its offices across the country gradually," sources said.    As part of extending the usage of Boithok, BCC has taken initiatives to provide training to officials of each of the 64 districts about its functions and usage, the sources added.    Currently, the platform is being used only in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Financial Institution Division, Economic Relations Division, Security Services Division, Bangladesh Police, Energy and Mineral Resources Division, ICT Division, BCC, Department of ICT (DoICT), Digital Security Agency (DSA) on regular basis.   During pandemic, last year e-Government Computer Incident Response Team (BGD e-Gov CIRT) of the Bangladesh Computer Council (BCC) of the ICT Division  developed Boithok for using at in government offices instead of using video conferencing platforms like Zoom, Google Meet and Microsoft Teams to ensure the security of information.   "Step has been taken to hold training for the officials of 64 district offices to extend the usage of Boithok at all government offices," said Executive Director of BCC Dr Abdul Mannan adding a workshop will be held tomorrow at Chittagong Deputy Commissioner's office about the functions and usages of Boithok.   Dr Mannan said one of the most important features of the Boithok platform is the unlimited duration of the meeting and it supports meeting hosting with  200 people, and the development team is working to extend the capability to 500 people.    The video and audio quality of the Boithok platforms are very smooth and clear and over 1,100 successful meetings have already been held on the Boithok platform so far and users can join a meeting just by clicking on a meeting link within a few seconds, he said.    Boithak is enabling the users to share their necessities, and thoughts through perfect instant secure video conferencing that create a real scenario of a virtual meeting. "This platform is completely secure and users' data are entirely safe. Here no data/ recordings are stored outside of the country," said Project Director of (BGD e-Gov CIRT Tarique M Barkatullah and added it supports also an end-to-end encryption feature.     Tarique said this video conferencing application is very easy to use and user friendly too as it supports Android, IOS, Linux as well as all popular browsers that we use daily, he added. Source: BSS AH

Video footage has emerged of what appears to be an Afghan police chief being brutally executed by the Taliban after he surrendered to the group. A video posted circulated on Twitter appears to show Haji Mullah Achakzai, who headed the police in Bagdhis province in Herat. The man in the clip is blindfolded and kneeling before several bullets ring out and his lifeless body flops onto the ground, New York Post reported. "This is their public amnesty," a US journalist who posted the clip on his account wrote in a sarcastic comment. The video follows a "general amnesty" announced on Tuesday by the Taliban for all Afghan government officials and urged them, including women, to return to work. The terrorist group also shared the video through a Taliban-related network, Afghan security advisor Nasser Waziri, who personally knew Achakzai, told Newsweek adding that the clip was verified by other police officers and government officials. The Taliban have also released 340 "political prisoners" in Farah province in western Afghanistan. Afghanistan is witnessing its worst-ever crisis in decades as the Taliban control has forced people to seek evacuations as they fear the atrocities they might face under the Taliban. Afghans have flocked to the Kabul airport in order to flee the Taliban. Terrorists on the streets of Kabul are reportedly preventing people from entering the airport using force. The situation continues to deteriorate at the airport and around its perimeter, which is under Taliban control. Soon after the terror group claimed control of the Afghan capital, several countries evacuated their diplomatic personnel from the country, and thousands of people flocked to the Kabul airport in a desperate attempt to leave Afghanistan. The world is closely watching the unfolding situation in Afghanistan as the countries have scrambled to evacuate their citizens from Afghanistan in an attempt to secure their people. Source: ANI

The gang raping video of two young women went viral on social media after one month of the incident at Vadail area under Ashulia in Savar. In this connection police have detained four members of a teenage gang. Police detained three from Ashulia and one from Khulna after conducting drive on Tuesday night and Wednesday morning. The detained are- Alamin, Zakir, Rakib and Shahrukh. Of them Shahrukh was detained from Khulna. Confirming the incident Sub Inspector Aswadur Rahman of Ashulia police station said, we have so far got information of eight to ten teenage gang members. Of them four were detained. We are also trying to detain the rest. It was known that the two victims were working at a hair factory. Nearly one month ago they went to visit a place with their male friends and fell victim of the teenage gang. At that time members of the teenage gang tied up the two male friends. Then 10 to 12 gang members raped the two young women one by one. The accused at that time recorded the scene of the incident. After about one month due to internal feud of the teenage gang one group uploaded the video on social media. Then the matter came to notice of the local administration. AH

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will hold a videoconference with the public representatives and officials of eight districts of Dhaka and Mymensingh divisions today on the present coronavirus situation in the country. “The videoconference will start at 10am at the prime minister’s official Ganabhaban residence, and the public representatives and officials of the eight districts of Dhaka and Mymensingh divisions will be connected to it,” PM’s Press Secretary Ihsanul Karim told BSS. The districts are Manikganj, Gazipur, Tangail and Kishoreganj of Dhaka division and Jamalpur, Sherpur, Netrokona and Mymensingh of Mymensingh division. Bangladesh Television, Bangladesh Betar and private TV channels and radio stations will broadcast the videoconference live, the press secretary said. Earlier, Sheikh Hasina exchanged views with the public representatives and officials of 40 districts of Dhaka, Chattogram, Khulna, Syhet and Barishal divisions in three phases via videoconference on the coronavirus situation. During the videoconferences, the Prime Minister announced various stimulus packages and steps to overcome the COVID-19 fallouts as well as gave different directives to the elected public representatives and officials to contain the deadly disease. The lethal virus till today claimed 91 lives and infected 2,456 people in Bangladesh since the country first reported COVID-19 positive cases on March 8. Source: BSS AH

The Cabinet Division on Sunday formed a five-member committee to look into the leaked video showing Jamalpur’s Deputy Commissioner Ahmed Kabir, who was made OSD, in a compromising situation with a female colleague. The Ministry of Public Administration issued a notification in this regard, said Additional Secretary (Zila and Field Administration) Gaffar Khan. Reports UNB.   Joint Secretary (Zila and Field Administration) Dr Mohammad Mushfiqur Rahman was made convener of the committee. The other members include representatives of the Public Administration Ministry, Mymensingh Divisional Commissioner and Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC).  Cabinet Division’s Deputy Secretary (Field Administration Discipline) was made member secretary of the committee.  The committee was directed to submit its report to the Cabinet Division within 10 working days.  Earlier in the day, Ahmed Kabir was made an officer on special duty (OSD) and attached to the Public Administration Ministry. He was replaced by Mohammad Enamul Haque, who was serving as the personal secretary to the planning minister. Talking to reporters at the secretariat over the incident, State Minister for Public Administration Farhad Hossain said the virtuousness certificate of Kabir will be withdrawn as he had committed an unethical deed. Replying to a query about having a private room for the DC, he said, “This incident has taught us to be careful in future.” The State Minister said if the woman involved in the incident is identified to be a government employee, both the DC and the woman will be punished. The video of Jamalpur DC and his female colleague was uploaded from a Facebook account named Khandakar Shohel on Thursday night but was removed on Friday. In the meantime, it went viral through the Facebook Messenger App within few hours that turned into the talk of social media platforms and drew public attention. Cabinet Secretary Mohammad Shafiul Alam on Saturday told UNB that they were looking into the matter. AH

Facebook has promised to explore restrictions on live-streaming, two weeks after it was used during gun attacks on two mosques in New Zealand. Chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg said the social media giant agreed with calls it "must do more". Fifty people were killed in the Christchurch shootings, and the original video of the attack was viewed 4,000 times before it was removed. Meanwhile, New Zealand is to review "inadequate" laws on hate speech. Justice Minister Andrew Little said the current laws did not tackle "the evil and hateful things that we're seeing online", and that the government and the Human Rights Commission would work to bring forward proposals by the end of the year. More than 20,000 people attended a memorial service in Christchurch on Friday to honor the 50 victims of the 15 March shooting. Of the dozens injured, 21 people remain in hospital, three of them in intensive care. What does Facebook say? "All of us at Facebook stand with the victims, their families, the Muslim community, and all of New Zealand," Ms Sandberg wrote in her letter to the New Zealand Herald. "Many of you have also rightly questioned how online platforms such as Facebook were used to circulate horrific videos of the attack... We have heard feedback that we must do more - and we agree." Ms Sandberg said: "First, we are exploring restrictions on who can go Live depending on factors such as prior Community Standard violations." Facebook said fewer than 200 people had watched the 17-minute video of the Christchurch shootings while it was live, and the first user report of the video came 12 minutes after it ended. Social media sites struggled to contain the attack video, which was copied onto the alt-right file-sharing site 8chan and then spawned 1.5 million copies. The chief operating officer did not announce any policy changes, but outlined how the social network would strengthen the rules for using Facebook Live and take greater steps to address hate on its platforms. The company has said it will block "praise, support and representation of white nationalism and separatism" on Facebook and Instagram from next week. Facebook has been heavily criticized within New Zealand in the wake of the attack over its lack of response to officials. The country's privacy commissioner wrote "your silence is an insult to our grief" to Facebook executives last week, according to the Herald. Facebook has said it is working with the New Zealand Police on its investigation. Source: BBC AH

Cleaners were dropping dirty materials on clean roads for inaugurating the cleanliness drive. Then after cleaning those trash Dhaka North City Corporation (DNCC) Mayor Atiqul Islam inaugurated the programs. Recently video of spreading waste went viral on social media facebook. Aftermath criticism began centering that video. Later, over allegation of delivering order for dropping waste on clean road DNCC Executive Engineer and Additional Chief Waste Management Officer SM Shafiqur Rahman was temporarily suspended. A press release said on Monday that he was temporarily suspended following approval of the DNCC Mayor. As well as suspending Shafiqur direction was given to terminate Work Supervisor Salahuddin from his duty who was appointed by the contractor of waste management department. Moreover, a three member investigation committee was formed headed by Chief Estate Officer Aminul Islam. The committee will submit the report to the Mayor within 7 work days. On Sunday on the occasion of 99th birth anniversary of father of the nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and national children’s day, DNCC organized a cleanliness drive and wall painting program on Mayor Annisul Huq Road and centering the program the cleaners were ordered to drop dirty papers on the road. As reports were published in the media, Mayor Atiqul Islam said that the matter was not in his knowledge and it was not the right way. AH

The authority of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman Science and Technology University (BSMRSTU) has expelled 6 students for lifetime over allegation of ragging. The decision of lifetime expulsion came into effect unanimously in a meeting at Proctor office on Monday participated by the Proctor, Assistant Proctor, Electronics and Telecommunication Engineering (ETE) department Chairman and Agriculture department teacher. The expelled students are: Shipon (Keraniganj, Dhaka), Shahin Mia (Narayanganj), Nadim Islam (Tangail), Hridoy Kumar Dhar (Sherpur), Turjoy Hawlader (Bhola) and Ashiquzzaman Limon (Madhukhali, Faridpur). They all are the second year students of ETE department under session 2017-18. In this regard BSMRSTU Proctor Ashiquzzaman Bhuiyan told Rtv online that the accused six were expelled for lifetime from the university according to proctorial body decision and a case is under process under ICT act against them. Mentionable, a video of ragging over the newly admitted students from 7 pm to 12 am on Saturday came into notice of university administration when it spread in social media facebook. AH      

Awami League candidate of Bagerhat-2 seat Sheikh Sarhan Naser Tonmoy has inspired the country’s young generation through uploading a video message on his Facebook page ‘Sheikh Tonmoy’ ahead of the December 30 general election. The video, which was uploaded on Saturday night, has witnessed 1.55 lakh viewers, 773 comments and 396 shares in just last 13 hours. In the video message, Sheikh Tonmoy said, “Assalamu Alaikum, there are about five crore youngsters in our country and I am also one of them. I hope that nobody will be able to use our young generation as a tool. This generation does not want bloodshed, war and violence. They want to build a country with transparency, decency and honesty.” Earlier on December 22, BNP secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir uploaded a video message to the countrymen through BNP's verifiable Facebook page. The video message became an issue of talk on the social networking sites. MHK