Court rules North Korea must pay reparations to Japanese migrants

January 26, 2026

North Korea ordered to compensate Japanese migrants — North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un was summoned by the Japanese court but failed to appear

A courtroom, an old woman, and a verdict that reaches across a hermit state

There was a hush in the Tokyo courtroom that felt almost like the pause before a confession. At its center sat Eiko Kawasaki, 83, her hands folded the way someone folds memory—carefully, as if to keep fragile things from spilling out. She arrived in North Korea as a teenager in 1960, persuaded by a dazzling promise: a life in a “paradise on Earth.” She spent 43 years there before finding her way back. On a gray Monday the Tokyo District Court told a different kind of story: that four people, including Kawasaki, had had “most of their lives taken away,” and that the state in Pyongyang should pay them compensation—some 20 million yen each (about €110,000).

The money is small, the court’s reach thin. The symbolism, however, is large: a Japanese court daring to pronounce judgment — if only in name — against North Korea, a state that rarely answers to other nations’ courts, and one whose leaders never darkened the courtroom door despite being summoned in the case record.

From glossy posters to harsh reality: how a dream became a trap

Between 1959 and 1984, more than 90,000 ethnic Koreans living in Japan, along with thousands of their Japanese spouses, left for the Korean peninsula under a repatriation drive that read in newspapers like a humanitarian epic. Promises of free housing, education, medicine, and a land restored by a revolutionary government painted a future so bright it blinded skeptics.

“They ran stories of reunions, of orchards and abundant rice,” recalled an elderly reporter who covered the era. “For many Zainichi Koreans—Koreans born and living in Japan after decades of colonial rule—this was not only a political promise, it was an emotional refuge.”

The repatriation effort was actively promoted by Chongryon, the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan, and carried the tacit backing of parts of the Japanese establishment. Tokyo’s official stance then was complicated—torn between postwar guilt, Cold War geopolitics, and a desire to reduce social friction at home.

But the reality awaiting returnees was far from glossy. Human Rights Watch, in a string of reports, and numerous testimonies gathered over decades describe a darker script: denial of basic rights, arbitrary detention, forced labor, political punishment of suspected dissidents, and, for some, decades of enforced isolation. Many who escaped later described starving, working in camps, and losing years to state surveillance. “We were sold a story,” said an anonymous former repatriate now living in Tokyo. “What we bought was a prison with a nice slogan.”

Numbers that matter

Period of repatriation: 1959–1984
Estimated people who moved: more than 90,000 (including thousands of Japanese spouses)
Compensation awarded by Tokyo court in this case: 20 million yen per plaintiff (about €110,000); total for four plaintiffs ≈ €440,000

A legal marathon with symbolism at every turn

The lawsuit itself reads like a prolonged act of defiance. Plaintiffs sought to sue the North Korean state directly—an unusual, uphill legal tactic given the absence of diplomatic relations and the practical impossibility of levying penalties against a closed-off regime. The district court initially dismissed the case in 2022 for lack of jurisdiction. A higher court overturned that dismissal the following year, sending the matter back for reconsideration.

“This is the first time a Japanese court has exercised its sovereignty in such a way against North Korea to recognise its malpractice,” Atsushi Shiraki, one of the plaintiffs’ lawyers, told reporters afterwards. “It’s historic, even if the road ahead remains steep.”

Human Rights Watch’s Japan director, Kanae Doi, called the ruling “one very important, successful example of attempts to hold North Korea accountable” for international crimes, underscoring that domestic courts can sometimes become venues for wider forms of transitional justice when international mechanisms stall.

The wrenching human toll

Legal language—“detainment,” “compensation,” “jurisdiction”—is dry, but the memories behind the words are raw. Plaintiffs recounted losing youth and family, missing funerals back home, and surviving under constant suspicion. Some buried their names, some buried their grief. The government’s assurances of free education or medicine often rang hollow. “You grow up thinking the state will protect you,” one plaintiff told me. “Then you learn the state can also erase you.”

These stories are not only about individual suffering; they are about a diaspora split by history. Many Zainichi Koreans who chose to stay in Japan continued to face discrimination for decades, while those who left sometimes found themselves trapped in a political purgatory—unable to return, unable to fully belong to the nation they had once imagined as home.

Can a court order ever reach Pyongyang?

Even as the plaintiffs celebrated a moral victory, they acknowledged a sobering reality: enforcing the judgment will be next to impossible. “I’m sure the North Korean government will just ignore the court order,” Kawasaki said plainly. Kenji Fukuda, lead counsel for the case, suggested a more pragmatic route—seeking to confiscate North Korean assets located in Japan, or pursuing claims against proxies where legal tie-ins exist.

That route is convoluted. North Korea’s international assets are limited and often entangled in shell companies or diplomatic protections. Sanctions, political tensions, and the lack of formal ties between Tokyo and Pyongyang make restitution a legal puzzle and a diplomatic minefield.

Why this matters beyond Japan and Korea

This verdict matters because it presses an uncomfortable question: what does accountability look like when states hurt people across borders and then seal themselves away? In an era where restorative justice, reparations, and truth commissions are being considered for atrocities from Sudan to Iraq, the Tokyo ruling is a modest but meaningful crystal in a larger mosaic.

It also forces readers to grapple with the human cost of propaganda. When governments promise utopias—whether in the 1960s or in our social media age—the results can be catastrophic for those who believe. Who bears responsibility: the recruiting organizations that sold the dream, the governments that greenlit it, or the broader societies that let marginalized communities feel their only options were elsewhere?

Closing, and an invitation

The court’s gavel may not wake those twenty or thirty years that were stolen, but it does place names and faces back into public record. It validates memory, if not fully restitution. As Kawasaki wiped tears after the verdict, she did not speak of money so much as of recognition: of having her life acknowledged in a world that often prefers stories that fit clean narratives.

What do you think—do symbolic victories like this matter? Can legal recognition ever be a form of healing when material restitution is impossible? As we scroll past headlines and outrage, perhaps we should pause on stories like this one—stories of migration, hope, and the slow work of justice—and ask ourselves what it means to hold a state accountable when it refuses to be seen.

Deadly U.S. winter storm claims at least 11 lives nationwide

hanad

January 26, 2026

Powerful winter storm kills at least 11 people across US — A man clears snow from a footpath near a garage in Bloomington in Indiana yesterday

When Ice Came Calling: A Storm That Reminded a Nation How Fragile Winter Can Be

There is a particular hush that falls after the first heavy sleet—an otherworldly quiet that muffles sirens and conversation and lets the world listen to itself. This weekend, that hush stretched from the Gulf Coast to the Canadian border, as a sprawling winter system smeared lanes of sleet and snow across the United States, toppled power grids, and left at least 11 people dead.

From city sidewalks to rural byways, people woke to a country paused. The National Weather Service warned that an Arctic air mass trailing the storm would sink temperatures to dangerous levels for days, prolonging the freezing-out of normal life even after the flakes stopped falling.

Across the Frozen Map

In New York City, Mayor Zohran Mamdani disclosed a chilling detail: five people were found dead outdoors over the weekend in subzero conditions. “There is no more powerful reminder of the danger of extreme cold,” he told reporters, his voice a steady thread through a city usually defined by its roar. The mayor stopped short of declaring each death weather-related, but the implication was clear—this storm was lethal.

Downstream, the losses were just as stark. Texas authorities confirmed three deaths, including a 16-year-old girl who died in a sledding accident; Louisiana’s health department reported two hypothermia fatalities; and Iowa’s state troopers said a winter-weather collision claimed another life while leaving two more hurt.

Power Outages Where They Bite the Most

PowerOutage.com tracked more than 840,000 customers in the dark as the storm intensified over the South. Tennessee bore the brunt: a band of ice downed lines and left more than 300,000 homes and businesses without electricity. Louisiana, Mississippi and Georgia—regions less accustomed to long ice storms—each had six-figure outage counts.

In places where winterization of pipes and power infrastructure is not a given, a loss of electricity turns bitter cold into a crisis. Space heaters, candlelight and neighborly hospitality replaced central heating for many. “We saw people hauling propane stoves out to the porch,” said one community volunteer in Baton Rouge. “Neighbors are checking on each other more than the news is.” This kind of mutual aid has become a lifeline.

Airports Grounded, Commutes Frozen

Major airports across the Northeast—Washington, Philadelphia, New York—reduced operations to near zero. FlightAware’s tracking showed more than 19,000 flights canceled since Saturday, leaving travelers stranded in terminals and delaying commerce that depends on a fluid sky.

Ronald Reagan National Airport in Virginia was effectively closed; federal offices in the capital shuttered preemptively; and more than 20 states declared states of emergency. “Stay off the roads unless absolutely necessary,” Texas’s Emergency Management Division posted on X, a short order repeated by municipal officials from Main Street to Midtown.

Images from the Storm

From Manhattan’s frozen puddles to Chicago’s frosting rooftops, the storm coated the familiar in unfamiliar texture. Trees bowed under ice, limbs cracking like old vinyl records, while city workers fought to keep lanes passable. In small towns, church basements opened as warming centers with volunteer casseroles and donated blankets set out on rows of folding chairs.

The Cold Mechanism: Polar Vortex and the Debate Around It

Behind the weather was a stretched polar vortex—normally a compact ring of Arctic air that sometimes loosens and spills frigid conditions southward. Meteorologists have increasingly linked disruptions in these patterns to a warming Arctic, though not all scientists agree on the scale or causality.

“The polar vortex is like a rubber band. When it snaps, the cold spills out,” explained one climatologist familiar with the phenomenon. “Climate change can make those rubber bands behave differently—more erratic. But it’s still a complex system with natural variability.” The conversation between immediate, record-setting cold and long-term warming trends is messy; it doesn’t fit neatly into soundbites.

President Donald Trump, sheltering at the White House, reacted on Truth Social: “We will continue to monitor, and stay in touch with all States in the path of this storm. Stay Safe, and Stay Warm!” and later asked rhetorically, “Whatever happened to global warming???” Such reactions underscore a broader public confusion about how short-term extremes relate to long-term climate trajectories.

Human Stories: Small Acts, Great Courage

On the outskirts of Memphis, an EMT named Shari pulled off the road to hand a freeze-stiffened man a thermal blanket. “I couldn’t leave him there,” she said. “You see the headlines—then you see a single person shivering on a bus bench and you know the numbers are faces.” In New York, shelter workers reported surges of people seeking refuge from the cold. “Our intake doubled overnight,” one shelter manager said. “Blankets ran out faster than we expected.”

Stories like these reveal an uncomfortable truth: weather mortality often maps onto social vulnerability. People experiencing homelessness, older adults on fixed incomes, and households without adequate insulation or funds for emergency heating are disproportionately at risk.

What This Storm Asks of Us

So what should we take from a weekend when ice brought the South to a shudder and the North to a freeze? First, that resilience is not evenly distributed. Second, that infrastructure—both physical and social—matters. Third, that climate conversations must bridge the immediate and the abstract.

Consider these facts:

At least 11 people died over the weekend across multiple states.
More than 840,000 customers experienced power outages, with Tennessee alone reporting over 300,000 affected.
Flight disruptions topped 19,000 cancellations; more than 20 states declared states of emergency.
Wind chill lows in parts of the northern plains and upper Midwest were forecast to plunge to around -45°C (-49°F), where frostbite can arrive within minutes.

Small Actions, Big Influence

There are practical things communities and individuals can do now: open warming centers, prioritize restoring power to critical facilities like hospitals and elder-care homes, and expand outreach to people sleeping outdoors. On a personal level, checking on neighbors, keeping emergency kits handy, and heeding official weather advisories save lives.

Here are a few simple reminders many communities are sharing:

Stay off the roads unless travel is essential.
If you lose power, use generators outdoors and never run them in enclosed spaces.
Look in on elderly neighbors and those with mobility issues.
Tune into local emergency channels and watch for updates from the NWS.

Looking Ahead: A Warming World That Gets Colder Sometimes

Weather will always have a way of humbling us. But these events also ask larger questions: Are our grids robust enough for extremes? Do our cities protect the most vulnerable? How do we translate the science of shifting atmospheric patterns into better planning and more humane emergency responses?

When the thaw finally comes, there will be a tally: repairs to roofs and power lines, insurance claims, and, tragically, lives that cannot be returned. But there will also be lessons, hard-earned and practical. Can we use them to build systems that keep people warm and safe, no matter what the sky does next?

As you read this, what would you do if your heater failed tomorrow? Who would you call? Whose doorstep would you check? The storm asked those questions of a nation this weekend—and the answers will shape how we weather the next one.

Human rights group: Iran protest deaths now nearly 6,000

hanad

January 26, 2026

Rights group says Iran protest death toll nears 6,000 — The Human Rights Activists News Agency said it had confirmed that 5,848 people had been killed during the protests, including 209 members of the security forces

When the Lights Went Out: Iran’s Winter of Protest and the Quiet before the Storm

Walk into Enghelab Square in Tehran and you can still smell the ash. Not from a single bonfire, but from months of anger that have been burned into the city’s memory—slogans wicked into walls, banners flapping where shops once hung glistening textiles, and a new billboard looming over the center that shows a U.S. aircraft carrier sinking beneath a smudge of black smoke. “If you sow the wind, you will reap the whirlwind,” its English words hiss like a cautionary tale to anyone who reads it.

This is not a tidy, one-paragraph story with neat causes and clear consequences. It began in late December as a chorus of economic complaints—jobs lost, prices skyrocketing, daily life hollowed by hardship—and by early January it had transformed into something far larger: mass street demonstrations that filled avenues and parks, voices rising against a system older than many of the protesters themselves.

The shadow of the blackout

Then the lights went out—not the streetlamps, but the internet. For 18 days and counting, Iran has been shrouded by a near-total communications blackout that officials insist is a matter of “security,” and rights groups warn is the cover for one of the most severe crackdowns in recent memory.

Netblocks, the internet-monitoring group, says the shutdown has “obscured the extent of a deadly crackdown on civilians,” tightening what it calls the “filternet” and allowing state narratives to move through a narrowed channel. “A blackout doesn’t just stop memes and videos,” a researcher at Netblocks told me. “It stops evidence. It stops coordination. And it stops the outside world from seeing what happens next.”

Counting the uncountable

How many lives were lost? There is no easy answer. A US-based rights organization, the Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA), says it has confirmed 5,848 deaths tied to the protests, including 209 members of the security forces—yet it also lists 17,091 possible additional fatalities still under investigation. Arrests, HRANA reports, exceed 41,000.

Iranian authorities, offering their first official tally, put the death toll at 3,117 and said most were security personnel or civilians killed by violent “rioters.” The discrepancy speaks to the blackout’s effect: we are reading from different dictionaries of truth, each defined by access.

HRANA confirmed deaths: 5,848 (plus 17,091 possible)
Iran official toll: 3,117
Arrests reported by HRANA: at least 41,283
Internet shutdown: 18 days and ongoing, per Netblocks

“These numbers are not just statistics,” said Leila, a rights activist who asked to speak on background because her family is still inside Iran. “They are names. They are funerals. But when the networks are down, names become rumors and funerals do not get counted.”

Tensions beyond the border

Meanwhile, the protests have rippled outward. The U.S. publicly keeps military options on the table—President Donald Trump has repeatedly said he would rather “not see anything happen,” while insisting a “massive fleet” is headed to the region “just in case.” U.S. media reported the deployment of the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln to the area, a move that brought an immediate, thunderous warning from Tehran.

“The arrival of such a battleship is not going to affect Iran’s determination and seriousness to defend the Iranian nation,” said Esmaeil Baghaei, an Iranian foreign ministry spokesman. The state has also plastered anti-American imagery across public spaces and mobilized allies: Hezbollah, the Lebanon-based group historically backed by Tehran, organized rallies supporting the Islamic Republic and warning against “American-Zionist sabotage.”

There is a poetry—and a danger—in the choreography of these actors. Inside Iran, the central conflict is about governance, dignity, and economic survival. Outside Iran, the same events are being read as pieces on a geopolitical chessboard.

Voices from the streets

Sitting in a teahouse near an alley where a protest once marched, Mahmoud, a shopkeeper whose storefront glass carries a spiderweb crack from a baton-throwing night, shrugged at the mention of outside military intervention. “We don’t need boats or bombs to change things,” he said, rubbing his fingers over a chipped cup. “We need to be able to speak to each other. We need to know people don’t disappear into the dark.” His voice was quiet but steady, as if rehearsing what should be obvious: agency, not invasion.

A young woman who gave her name as Zahra, a university student, laughed when asked whether she thought foreign troops could help. “They could lift the carrier into our living rooms, but they cannot lift the fear from our mothers’ hearts,” she said. “Change, if it comes, has to be for us and by us.”

The anatomy of a modern crackdown

What we are witnessing is now a template seen in other countries: protest movements grow from economic grievance into demands for political reform; states respond with force and information controls; outside powers posture, and diaspora media scramble to stitch the story together. But each replay reveals fresh cruelties—arrest numbers in the tens of thousands, funerals held quietly at dusk, journalists blocked or expelled, rights workers hunted.

“These are not spontaneous hiccups,” a veteran human-rights researcher told me. “They are deliberate strategies: silence the networks, flood the streets with masked forces, push a narrative that frames all dissent as foreign-instigated. It’s an old playbook with new tools.”

What the world should watch

We can watch the immediate signs: the billboard in Enghelab Square, the rallies in Beirut where Hezbollah voices speak, the tweets that momentarily slip through the filtration. But there are larger currents at work: the erosion of civic space, the normalization of internet shutdowns, and the geopolitical feedback loop that makes local grievances global flashpoints.

Ask yourself: when a state chooses to sever its people’s digital lifeline, who holds it to account? How do we verify a death toll when witnesses cannot share their testimony? And perhaps more fundamentally—what responsibility do distant governments have when their military presence risks becoming a catalyst rather than a cure?

After the sirens

Winter has a way of revealing what summer conceals: the bones of buildings, the sturdiness of friendships, the fragility of systems. Whether these protests will end in reshaping the political landscape, in repression that for a time smothers dissent, or in something in between remains uncertain. The only thing we can say for sure is that when the blackout ends and the first videos reappear, the world will see scars and stories that were once hidden.

“We are not helpless,” Zahra told me as she left the teahouse, shoulders squared against the cold. “We are tired, yes. Angry, yes. But not helpless. That is what they fear the most.” Her confession lingers: a reminder that beyond the charts and carrier movements and diplomatic sparring, this story is, at its core, about people who want to be seen and heard.

Will the world listen? Or will we wait for the next blackout to learn the same lesson anew?

Labour panel blocks Burnham’s attempt to reclaim his MP seat

hanad

January 26, 2026

Burnham's bid to return as MP blocked by Labour body — Andy Burnham is regarded as a potential rival to party leader Keir Starmer

The day Manchester’s mayor was told “not yet”: inside a choice that exposed Labour’s fault lines

The rain had just let up over Manchester when I walked past Piccadilly Gardens and felt the city’s familiar mix of grit and optimism: builders’ vans, a woman hauling grocery bags, a teenager with a football tucked under his arm. It’s the sort of place where the person on the campaign leaflets becomes almost tangible—the mayor you see at community centres, at hospital launches, on TV reminding people they’re not invisible.

So when Andy Burnham, the city’s twice-elected mayor and a national figure with long Westminster experience, sought permission this week to run for parliament in a sudden by-election, it felt like the opening of a chapter in a political novel. But the plot took a sharp turn: Labour’s National Executive Committee (the NEC), the party’s governing body, declined to grant him permission. The reason given was pragmatic—avoiding the cost and disruption of a mayoral by-election in Greater Manchester while the party prepares for elections in May—but the reverberations are about more than money.

What the NEC said — and what it didn’t

Labour’s ruling body released a statement explaining that directly elected mayors must seek NEC approval before standing as candidates for Westminster. The committee argued that Burnham’s attempt to contest the Gorton and Denton seat would have triggered a mayoral by-election, one that would divert funds, volunteers and attention away from the party’s wider campaign ahead of the May local elections and the votes for the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh Senedd.

“We must weigh the public cost and the campaign risk,” a senior NEC source told me off the record. “A mayoral by-election isn’t just a headline; it’s tens, possibly hundreds of thousands of pounds, and it draws on people-power we can’t afford to scatter right now.”

That financial framing was the core justification: the NEC said it feared “a substantial and disproportionate impact on party campaign resources,” even though the committee was confident Labour would retain the mayoralty. But to many, the ruling felt less like neutral stewardship and more like a political block—one that keeps a high-profile potential rival in his current post rather than letting local members decide.

Local reactions: pride, puzzlement and a sting of disappointment

On the market stalls of Gorton, where the by-election will be fought, people’s responses were a patchwork.

“This is local democracy, isn’t it?” said Aisha Khan, a hairdresser who has lived in the area for 24 years. “I want to choose the person who will be our MP. If Andy thinks he can help, why shouldn’t members have a say? It feels like decisions are being made upstairs and we’re not in the room.”

At a community centre in Denton, a retired teacher named Paul Griffiths shrugged. “Andy’s done good by the city,” he said, stirring his tea. “But I worry about money—if a new election would cost taxpayers, that’s not great either. It’s messy.”

Party unity vs. local democracy: a long-running tension

The row has highlighted a perennial dilemma for political parties: who gets the final say—local members or central bodies? Inside Labour’s tent the debate has become urgent and emotionally charged. Several senior figures, including deputy leader Lucy Powell and cabinet minister Ed Miliband, publicly urged that the question of Burnham’s candidature be left to local members to decide. Both are members of the NEC, and their intervention suggests this was not a straightforward procedural matter but one with broader strategic and symbolic stakes.

“There’s a real desire among activists to be trusted,” said a city councillor who supported Burnham’s application. “People are fed up with top-down decisions. If the job was to build trust between the party and its grassroots, this didn’t help.”

What Burnham himself said

Burnham framed his bid in moral, almost heroic terms. In a letter to the NEC he described the Gorton and Denton by-election as “the front line” of a fight against divisive politics, saying he felt a duty to step forward. “I owe it to a city which has given me so much to lead from the front,” he wrote—a sentiment that resonates with many who see him as a mayor deeply embedded in the life of Greater Manchester.

To some, his stance reads like the final act of a seasoned Westminster hand who prefers to lead from a platform of proven local credibility; to others it carries the hint of a leadership centre of gravity shifting away from party headquarters.

The practicalities: costs, timing and other looming votes

There are concrete reasons the NEC was anxious. The UK’s local elections in May are already a logistical mountain—councils across the country prepare thousands of polling stations, and political parties marshal volunteers, staff and cash to contest seats. The Scottish Parliament has 129 members and the Senedd 60, and both devolved institutions will demand campaign focus and resources.

By-elections for mayoral posts are relatively rare and costly. Officials estimate such an election in Greater Manchester could run into tens of thousands of pounds at minimum and could stretch into the low hundreds of thousands depending on turnout and the length of the campaign. In an era where councils are facing budget squeezes and charity groups are reporting more people needing help with basics, the optics of ordering a new election are politically sensitive.

Beyond Manchester: what this says about modern parties

This isn’t just a Manchester story. Across democracies, parties are balancing organizational cohesion with pressures for democratic participation. Central bodies argue for discipline and strategic coordination; local activists push for agency and the right to choose. Which side wins often shapes how voters perceive a party’s openness.

“You can’t pretend there’s no tension here,” said Dr. Emily Carter, a political scientist who studies party organisation. “Central committees worry about resource efficiency and message discipline. Local members want authenticity and voice. Both concerns are valid, but they pull in different directions.”

Ask yourself: would you trust a party that always defers to local activists, even when coordination matters? Or would you prefer a tight central hand that sometimes looks paternalistic? There are no easy answers—only trade-offs.

What’s next

The NEC says it remains confident of winning the upcoming by-election without Burnham on the ballot. Labour will field another candidate in Gorton and Denton, and the seat—vacated after the MP cited health reasons—will be contested by a field of hopefuls. For Burnham, the refusal closes one door and leaves others open: his role as Manchester’s mayor remains secure for now, and he continues to be a figure who looms large in national conversations about Labour’s direction.

For the people of Manchester, this episode will be remembered not just as a political skirmish but as a signal—a test of how parties steward local voices when national strategy bites. The bigger question is whether the party can reconcile that tension before the next set of ballots arrive.

Closing thoughts

Walking back through the city that evening, I saw a poster on a lamppost for a cost-of-living advice centre, and a group of teenagers passing a pizza box. Politics in Manchester, as elsewhere, is woven into daily life—the practical concerns of heating bills, school places, the state of the neighbourhood park. Decisions made in meeting rooms and committee hearings ripple into those ordinary moments.

Is centralised caution protecting the public purse, or is it shutting down democratic choice? Does a mayor more useful in city hall mean a lost opportunity for change in Westminster? These are debates that will outlive a single by-election—and they are worth watching closely, not just in Manchester but across democracies where party control and grassroots voice are forever negotiating their fragile balance.

Political fallout mounts after Minnesota’s second shooting incident

hanad

January 26, 2026

Political backlash grows after second Minnesota shooting — A Minneapolis police officer throws tear gas at people gathered in Minneapolis

They came for coffee. A man left in a pool of questions.

On a frost-stiff Saturday morning in Minneapolis, people arrived at the corner coffee shop for the ordinary comforts of caffeine and conversation. Instead, they got a demolition of certainty: bright cell-phone screens, a growing crowd, a federal operation unfolding on the sidewalk, and then, in a breadth of seconds that still feels impossible, a man on the pavement and the roar of shots that would send the city into a week of grief and fury.

If you watched the videos—if you live in the loop where social feeds and cable news replace front pages—then you know the frames. You know the way cameras hesitate, the way witnesses whisper into their devices. But knowing the picture does not make the questions easier. What was a medical nurse doing among federal agents? Why did national officials, within hours, call him a would-be domestic terrorist? And why, as images proliferated online, did those words not line up with the pictures?

What unfolded that morning

The man shot was identified in hospital and social networks as Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old nurse who worked in the ICU at the Minneapolis VA. Witnesses at the scene say Mr. Pretti was filming with his phone or holding it as he helped someone to their feet when federal agents—part of an immigration enforcement operation—moved in. Videos circulating online appear to show an agent taking a handgun from Mr. Pretti’s waistband. As the agent walks away, the first shot rings out. The footage that other bystanders captured becomes the lens through which the nation has tried to make sense of the event.

“He was just trying to help a woman who slipped,” said Maya Hernandez, 24, a barista who watched from the shop’s window. “Everyone had their phones up. One moment he’s standing, the next—bang. People started screaming. Nobody expected blood.”

Officials turn up the rhetoric

Within hours, the federal message had hardened. Department of Homeland Security leaders and the border agency’s public spokesman described Mr. Pretti not as a bystander but as a threat—someone determined to “massacre” officers, they said, who had “brandished” a weapon and “assaulted” agents at the scene.

That language landed like a blow. It shaped how some viewers interpreted the raw footage; it shaped how lawmakers readied their responses. But for many who watched the videos, the official framing felt retrofitted to the images—an uneasy mismatch between claim and captured reality.

“They called him a suspect before any independent review,” said Asha Verma, a policy analyst at a Minneapolis-based public-safety institute. “When officials use incendiary language, it changes everything: the public’s perception, the political calculus, and the urgency with which people demand accountability.”

Evidence, bodycams and the court of social media

One of the most ferocious modern ironies is that footage both empowers and muddles. The bystander videos sped around the country within hours—rewinds for television, threads of analysis on social platforms, frame-by-frame breakdowns by citizen-investigators who treat each pixel like testimony. Yet officials say they have footage the public has not seen: bodycam video, internal recordings, other perspectives that could explain what was allegedly unseen on the viral clips.

“If you have exonerating material, put it out,” implored Tom Li, 42, a neighbor who runs a small nonprofit and watched the clip dozens of times. “We need to know—because right now we’re watching a man die on repeat and trying to reconcile that with words like ‘terrorist.’ That’s a dangerous contradiction.”

What we know and what we don’t

We know: Cellphone footage shows Mr. Pretti injured on the sidewalk and a handgun taken from his waistband.
We don’t know: Whether agents perceived an imminent threat that justified the use of deadly force; whether additional video exists that shows actions unseen in the public clips.
We know: Federal officials publicly described Mr. Pretti as a violent threat within hours.
We don’t know: What documentary evidence, if any, underlies those public assertions.

Political shockwaves

The impact was instant and pervasive. Senate leaders face a live political crisis as they consider whether to advance legislation that funds DHS, including ICE and Border Patrol operations. Senators from both parties said their votes would hinge on the administration’s transparency and the outcome of independent investigations. In Washington’s calculations, footage is not just evidence; it is leverage.

“We cannot hand over more money without an independent inquiry,” said a senior Democratic aide who asked not to be named. “This isn’t about funding in the abstract; it’s about how federal agencies operate in our communities.”

Meanwhile, in Minnesota—where the VA nurse who died was a local worker and where the balance between federal enforcement and municipal sovereignty is already fraught—state leaders called for answers. “Our communities deserve truth,” said a state official. “And families deserve to grieve without their loved ones being called criminals on the morning of their funerals.”

Voices from the street, the hospital and the studio

In the small circles that make up a city, reactions vary but share an undercurrent of mistrust. At the VA hospital, colleagues still process the loss of a nurse described by some as “selfless” and “steady.”

“Alex was the guy who sat with veterans when nobody else could,” said a coworker, who asked that her name not be used. “He’d work triple shifts. To have him named a terror suspect—that’s an insult to his life.”

On national television, the face of the border agency defended the narrative. He reiterated that agents felt endangered, and he suggested their training justified the preemptive use of force. To viewers, the exchange only deepened the divide between official account and public perception.

Why this matters beyond Minneapolis

There are bigger currents under this story: the federalization of law enforcement; the friction between local governments and national immigration priorities; the weaponization of narrative in a polarized media environment. And woven through all of it is the role of the Second Amendment and how Americans interpret public demonstrations where firearms may be present.

“This is a moment, not just for a single family, but for the country,” said Professor Elena Morales, who studies police accountability. “How we respond to these incidents—independent investigations, timely release of evidence, clear rules about federal-local cooperation—will determine whether trust frays further or begins to mend.”

Questions to sit with

When federal agents operate in a city, who sets the rules of engagement?
How should authorities weigh the public’s right to see evidence with the need for a fair investigation?
What happens to public trust when language from the top does not match the images on our screens?

What comes next

Investigations will proceed. Videos may be released. Lawmakers will posture, bargain and vote. Protesters will again take to streets already hardened by earlier clashes. A funding bill hangs in the balance—potentially tipping toward a shutdown if leaders cannot find common ground on transparency and reform. And a family will bury someone described, by those who knew him, as a caretaker.

For readers watching from elsewhere in the world, this is more than another American headline. It is a story about the erosion and repair of trust between people and the institutions supposed to protect them. It is about how technology has turned citizens into witnesses and witnesses into prosecutors. It is about what we demand from public servants when a clip on our phones becomes the only unmediated evidence we can trust.

What would you do if you saw a man fall on a sidewalk and the authorities’ words did not match what your eyes told you? How much evidence should be withheld in the name of procedure before the public loses faith?

There are no simple answers. But the persistence of the question matters. Because if a democracy cannot demand clear, timely truths when a life ends in public, then the scaffolding of accountability starts to creak—quietly at first, then loudly, in ways that touch us all.

Trump administration defends fatal shooting of Minneapolis man by federal officer

hanad

January 26, 2026

Trump to charge $1bn for 'peace board' membership — Donald Trump would be the chairman of the peace board

Minneapolis in Winter: A City Holding Its Breath

The snow on the sidewalks had the brittle quality of old paper—scuffed, compacted, gray at the edges. People pressed their faces into scarves and held candles with mittened hands, leaving them at the base of a hurried shrine: a bouquet slightly snow-matted, a laminated photo, a nurse’s badge pinned to a mound of flowers.

It was here, under a streetlight and the slow drip of thawing ice, that a neighborhood tried to make sense of the killing of Alex Pretti. He was 37, an intensive care nurse at a Veterans Affairs hospital, the kind of person who spent more time giving oxygen than taking it. The scene—cold, intimate, furious—felt less like a news snapshot and more like a small town’s eruption of grief replayed on the big-city stage.

What Happened: A Short Timeline

Saturday: Confrontation between federal immigration agents and protesters in Minneapolis. Multiple bystander videos recorded the events.
Moments later: Alex Pretti is seen filming with a mobile phone, is pushed and pepper-sprayed, then pinned to the ground. A pistol is removed from his waistband in the footage; seconds later, he is shot multiple times.
Aftermath: State officials request court protections to preserve evidence. Vigils swell. Local and national leaders call for answers.

The Video vs. the Official Account

In the age of the smartphone, the first drafts of many tragedies are recorded by strangers. Several bystander clips, verified by independent journalists, show Mr. Pretti holding only a phone while trying to help others pushed to the ground. The footage shows federal agents grappling with him, forcing him onto his hands and knees. Then a pistol—pulled from his waistband by an agent—appears in the video. Less than a heartbeat later, shots ring out.

Federal officials defended the agents’ actions, saying they faced a lethal threat. “Our personnel acted to protect themselves,” a senior immigration official told reporters. The explanation landed like ice in the mouths of those waiting at the shrine. “That was not self-defense,” said a woman in medical scrubs, gripping tissue against her lips. “That was a man doing his job as a nurse, and now he’s gone.”

Clarity and Confusion

A former field chief for immigration enforcement, now speaking publicly for the first time about the operation, said the clip suggested fractured communication among agents. “On camera you can see people acting independently—one officer pulling a weapon, another shooting—no coordinated call of ‘weapon presented’ or ‘firearm neutralized,’” he said. “You need command, and you need clear roles. What we saw wasn’t that.”

Whatever the motive, the local and national response was immediate. Minneapolis’s mayor and governor asked the federal government to extract its forces. A federal judge issued a temporary order banning the destruction or alteration of evidence relating to the case. At least a dozen federal prosecutors reportedly stepped away from another investigation in protest at how Justice Department officials handled a similar killing earlier in the month.

Neighbors, Nurses, and the Human Story

In the days after, more than 200 healthcare workers—scrubs still smelling faintly of antiseptic—gathered near the spot where Pretti died. They left small medical items beside flowers: a pair of nitrile gloves, a Post-it with a hastily scrawled note, a badge from the VA.

“He was gentle with everybody,” a colleague said, eyes reddened, voice quiet. “He’d hum to Veterans who couldn’t sleep. If you were scared, he sat down next to you and made you laugh. That’s how I’ll remember him.”

At the vigil, a teenage protester in a University of Minnesota parka blew a whistle as the crowd marched. “We’re tired of seeing bodies on our streets,” she told me. “It doesn’t matter if the person had a permit, or if the government says they were a threat—the question is: why are we at a place where the armed face of the federal state shoots people on our sidewalks?”

Local Color

Minneapolis—home to lakes that freeze like glass and to corporations whose logos you see on the highways—has been transformed by the deployment. The city that gave America Prince and a downtown skyline of glass now sees masked federal agents moving through neighborhoods with little warning. Ice melt streaked byfootprints; a city bus idled while passengers peeked out to watch the protest march past; a Target employee on a cigarette break shook his head and said simply, “This is not who we are.”

Legal Battles, Corporate Voices, and National Echoes

Local and state leaders have challenged the federal operation in court. The state seeking injunctive relief argues that the nationwide deployment of immigration officers into a city to carry out sweeping operations raises constitutional questions about local control and civil liberties. Business leaders, from firms headquartered in the region, have urged calm and cooperation: Target, Cargill, Best Buy—names that suggest a different version of the city, steadier and less raw—published a letter calling for “immediate de-escalation.”

On the national level, former presidents weighed in. Their statements—broad, moral, stirring—echoed across social media and television, framing these local tragedies as part of a larger American story: of civic norms fraying, of law enforcement tactics shifting, of the perennial debate over federal power and local sovereignty.

Why This Matters Beyond Minneapolis

Ask yourself: what does it mean when a city’s sidewalks become a theater of federal enforcement? The push-and-pull between federal agencies and local communities is not new, but the scale and optics of Minneapolis’ moment matter.

Consider a few facts to ground the concern:

The U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 decisions expanded the scope of gun rights in public spaces, complicating how law enforcement evaluates perceived threats.
In large cities across the country, federal immigration operations are increasingly visible—sometimes to the consternation of mayors and local police chiefs.
At least two U.S. citizens were killed by federal immigration agents in Minneapolis this month, a reality that has catalyzed protests involving thousands of residents.

These are not abstract legal questions only lawyers debate. They are questions of trust: Can a community rely on the people with guns to protect them, or do those same people become a new source of fear?

What Comes Next?

There will be investigations, and there will be court filings. There will be more videos made on phones and more vigils on cold streets. And there should be scrutiny—of tactics, of chain-of-command, of the legal theories justifying the deployment of federal enforcement inside an American city.

“We need to slow down and look at policy,” a law professor who studies policing told me. “This is a policy choice as much as an operational decision. Once you militarize civic spaces, the chance for tragic mistakes rises.”

For the people who knew Alex Pretti—those he nursed, those who shared a break room with him—the questions are simpler and sharper. Who will answer for this? How do we honor a life that tended to others when he was cut down in the act of what witnesses say was trying to help?

Maybe you, reading this, feel a distance from Minneapolis—an ocean, a time zone, an ideological divide. Or maybe you recognize the pattern: the heavy footsteps of power in your own city, the flicker of a candle at a memorial you passed once, the unease when a protest turns into a headline. What would you want your leaders to do? To listen, to restrain, to investigate, to rebuild trust?

In the end, the city’s candles will melt, footprints become slush, and daily life will press on. But the questions raised by these shootings—about force, about federal reach, about the value placed on life—will linger, like the smell of winter in the air. Minneapolis, bruised and watchful, will keep asking them until it gets answers.

Migrant deaths rise amid Trump’s escalating immigration enforcement push

hanad

January 26, 2026

Day of reckoning coming for Minnesota, says Trump — A memorial to Renee Nicole Good outside the US embassy in Berlin

When Snow Turns to Shouts: A City at the Center of a Nation’s Toughest Enforcement

On a bitter January afternoon in Minneapolis, steam rose from the city streets like the exhalations of a city holding its breath. The air was thin and raw; people wrapped scarves up to their noses, the kind of cold that makes chanting hurt. Still, thousands gathered—voices cracking in the cold, signs clenched in numb fingers—demanding answers, demanding that the swarm of federal agents encamped in their neighborhoods leave.

The death of a man at the hands of a federal agent this week has become one more painful stitch in a rapidly tightening national narrative: the human cost of an unprecedented immigration enforcement surge. In a matter of weeks, the headlines have traced a grim trail—shootings, detention deaths, conflicting accounts and an answer that feels incomplete to many.

A life interrupted

The man who died in Minneapolis, reported in local outlets as Alex Pretti, was known around his neighborhood as a nurse who kept odd hours and loved crossword puzzles. “He was the kind of person who wouldn’t hesitate to help,” said Marjorie Klein, 68, who lives two blocks from where the altercation unfolded. “He’d check on neighbors, shovel the steps of an elderly lady. This is just incomprehensible.”

According to the Department of Homeland Security, a Border Patrol agent fired after Mr. Pretti resisted attempts to be disarmed. But a mosaic of bystander videos circulating on social media and verified by independent journalists tells a more complicated story: footage shows agents pepper-spraying Mr. Pretti as he records them with his phone, then wrestling him to the ground. No weapon is visible in the recordings before multiple gunshots ring out.

“We are calling for a full, independent investigation,” said Council Member Amina Hassan, who has been at the protests almost daily. “People here feel like their city has been taken over—it’s an occupation. You can see it on their faces. You can see it in the way parents pull their kids in close.”

Protests in sub-zero temperatures

Temperatures plunged below freezing as demonstrators pressed on, wrapping themselves in layers and huddling around makeshift heaters. Their signs mixed anger with sorrow: “Investigate, Don’t Occupy,” read one; another: “No More Militarized Checkpoints.” A chorus of chants—”No more ICE!” and “People over policy!”—rose from a crowd made up of longtime residents, immigrant families, college students and retired nurses.

“It felt like we had to be here,” said Diego Ramirez, 24, a local organizer who traveled across town in a wool coat and gloves. “If we don’t show up now, this becomes our new normal. What kind of country lets federal forces snatch people off the street for civil violations?”

Five shootings, mounting questions

The Minneapolis shooting was the latest in a series of law-enforcement-involved shootings this month tied to immigration operations. In all, federal agents were involved in five shootings across January—an alarming cluster for what should be routine civil enforcement. One of the other incidents took place in Portland, Oregon, where a Border Patrol agent wounded a Venezuelan driver, Luis Nino-Moncada, and a passenger. DHS described it as a response to an attempted vehicle attack; prosecutors have since filed assault charges against Mr. Nino-Moncada, while his passenger, Yorlenys Zambrano-Contreras, recently pleaded guilty to unlawful entry.

Another episode in Minneapolis saw an ICE agent shoot a man in the leg after what DHS described as an assault involving a shovel and a broom handle. But court filings unsealed this week revealed that officers were pursuing the wrong license plate—a simple mistake, perhaps, with striking consequences. An FBI affidavit suggested the officers had chased the car of an innocent person after scanning a plate registered to someone else suspected in an immigration matter.

“When enforcement becomes a dragnet, the margin for error grows,” said Dr. Maya Patel, a migration and human-rights scholar at the University of Minnesota. “And every mistake is amplified when there’s a weapon in the mix. We need clarity—where did failures happen, and how are they being addressed?”

Detention centers: an invisible crisis now visible

Beyond the flash of firearms, a quieter but no less harrowing tally has emerged: at least six people have died in federal immigration detention this month alone. That follows roughly 30 deaths in ICE custody last year—a two-decade high. Families, lawyers, and advocates are demanding medical records, CCTV footage, and transparency as agency explanations shift and evolve.

Take the case of Geraldo Lunas Campos, a Cuban detainee who died on 3 January at a detention site on a military base in Texas. Initially, agency statements said he experienced “medical distress.” Later narratives suggested he attempted suicide and resisted officers. This week, the El Paso County medical examiner classified the death as a homicide, citing “asphyxia due to neck and torso compression.”

“The shifting story is exactly what fuels distrust,” said Erika Campos, a detention-rights attorney who has represented detainees for a decade. “When agencies change their description of death after public pressure—first ‘medical distress,’ then ‘suicide’—people have to ask: why the change? Who’s been accountable?”

ICE figures show that detention levels have swollen under new enforcement priorities. Early this month, roughly 69,000 people were held in immigration custody—levels not seen in recent years. Nearly 43% of those picked up by ICE had no criminal charge or conviction, according to the agency’s own statistics, highlighting a fundamental tension: mass detention for civil infractions.

Money, manpower and a political moment

All of this is taking place under a new, enormous budgetary umbrella: the administration has earmarked roughly $170 billion for immigration agencies through September 2029. And the visible symbol of that investment has been people—some 3,000 federal agents deployed to Minneapolis alone this month.

“The administration says it’s about removing dangerous criminals,” said Daniel Ruiz, a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson in a statement. “But we are also focused on enforcing civil laws meant to preserve order at the border and in our communities. Our agents are trained to apprehend and, when needed, defend.”

But many of those detained were apprehended for civil violations—the legal equivalent of a traffic ticket in other contexts—fuelling questions about proportionality, due process and the human impact of bureaucratic zeal.

What does accountability look like?

As the city of Minneapolis mourns and protests, as attorneys file subpoenas and as families demand answers, a larger question hangs in the cold air: what does a humane, effective immigration policy look like in a world of mass displacement and political polarization?

Should enforcement prioritize violent offenders? How much transparency should oversight bodies demand from federal agencies operating in communities? And perhaps most fundamentally: how does a democratic society balance the rule of law with the preservation of basic human dignity?

“We are not against borders,” said Nadia Ortiz, an immigrant-rights organizer, her breath fogging in the light. “We are against a system that treats people like numbers. We want rules that are fair, we want transparency, and we want accountability when things go wrong.”

Where we go from here

Minneapolis, with its frozen streets and boiling tensions, has become a focal point for those questions. For now, families grieve, investigators collect footage, and residents bundle up to march again. Whether those marches change policy or simply register outrage remains to be seen.

But one thing is clear: every life lost adds urgency to debates that are too often reduced to rhetoric. Across town, an elderly neighbor still shovels snow for those who can’t. At the protest, a young organizer keeps her placard dry. They, like the rest of us, are left to ask: what kind of country do we want to be—one that arms and detains, or one that enforces borders while protecting the dignity of those who cross them?

These are not abstract questions. They are immediate, urgent, and human. And they will likely echo through the courts, the halls of Congress, and the living rooms of towns across the country long after the snow melts.

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