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washington — British researchers say Chinese nationalist trolls have been posing as American supporters of former President Donald Trump on X to try to exploit domestic divisions ahead of the U.S. election. A report released April 1 by the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, a London think tank, says it found four previous Mandarin-tweeting accounts that went silent before re-emerging as American Trump supporter personas tweeting in English. It linked them to China’s so-called Spamouflage network, which it described as a “long-running and widespread but largely ineffective” campaign to promote pro-Chinese Communist Party narratives. But Elise Thomas, a senior researcher at the institute and author of the report, said pretending to be Trump supporters is a fresh and more effective tactic. “They are posing convincingly as Americans, specifically Trump supporters,” she told VOA. “They are getting engagement from what look like real American users. That's significantly different from what we've seen with Spamouflage in the past.” She pointed out that a traditional Spamouflage tweet might have many likes and retweets, but upon further examination, it’s all from other Spamouflage accounts. Now, they are interacting with predominantly genuine American users. “What they are doing that is quite different from other Spamouflage accounts is that they are building up authentic audiences using this thing called patriot follow trains, which is basically where people agree to mutually follow one another in order to each build their own follower accounts,” Thomas explained. Using real viral videos and photos, these accounts seek to amplify divisive issues such as LGBTQ rights, immigration, race, gun control and crime rates. Some of the accounts mock Biden’s age; others falsely claim that Biden is a pedophile. All seem to be promoting Trump’s slogan “Make America Great Again (MAGA),” leading the report to dub this new tactic “MAGAflage.” One of the X accounts, Ben MAGA 2024, was opened in 2010, but previous posts have been deleted. Since April 18, 2023, the account began to tweet in English with a main theme: Biden is a pedophile and cannot be trusted. The account tries to build a persona as an American living in Los Angeles. It posted a picture in January with the caption “Good morning! Patriots, I’m 43 years old, and passionately and loyally supporting President Trump!” In fact, the picture belongs to a travel blog by a Danish man with no indication that he’s a Trump supporter.   This account also retweeted a video from Russian state media Russia Today on February 18, claiming that Biden and the Central Intelligence Agency had sent a neo-Nazi leader to fight in Ukraine. That post was retweeted by Alex Jones, an American far-right conspiracy theorist and radio show host with 2.2 million followers on X. The post had been viewed nearly 360,000 times as of March 4. Thomas said by wrapping a topic in a U.S. partisan political frame, they got “a reasonable amount of engagement” from real American users. This mimics Russia’s playbook during the 2016 U.S. presidential election, when U.S. officials say Moscow used information warfare to damage the Clinton campaign, boost Trump’s chances and sow distrust in American democracy, which the Kremlin denies. The report said some Spamouflage accounts could also be posing as left-wing Biden supporters, though they did not find any. Twitter has since suspended all the accounts mentioned in the institute’s report. While just a handful of accounts were identified, the report says there are almost certainly many more, which Thomas worries could have an unseen effect on the U.S. election. “These [MAGAflage] accounts were very difficult to find. It took quite a lot of time, and I’ve only been able to find a relatively small number of them,” she said. “But because what we know from Spamouflage’s history is that everything it does, it does at massive scale. It would be really out of character for them to be only doing this, if it's effective, at a small scale. So, that’s my concern, that it may be happening at a significantly larger scale.” VOA reached out to the Trump and Biden campaigns for comment but did not receive a response as of publication time. The Spamouflage network was discovered in 2019 by social media analytics firm Graphika and was first used to target Hong Kong pro-democracy protesters. Researchers said the network is tied to “individuals associated with Chinese law enforcement,” and has been active across thousands of accounts and more than 50 platforms and forums, including Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube and X.   On March 11, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence issued its annual assessment on the major threats to U.S. interests around the world and warned that China's government may "attempt to influence the U.S. elections in 2024 at some level because of its desire to sideline critics of China and magnify U.S. societal divisions." Liu Pengyu, a spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in Washington, said in a statement sent to VOA that China is “committed to the principle of noninterference” and that claims about Beijing influencing U.S. presidential elections are “completely fabricated.” Meta in August shut down close to 9,000 Facebook and Instagram accounts, groups and pages associated with the Spamouflage network.

GOMA, DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF THE CONGO — Mortar fire in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo has killed three Tanzanian soldiers who were part of a southern Africa force deployed to help government troops battling M23 rebels, officials said.  The regional force sent soldiers to North Kivu province in December to help Kinshasa regain ground from the M23 militia in the lawless east.  The force includes soldiers from regional military heavyweight South Africa, Tanzania and Malawi.  "This unfortunate incident happened after a hostile mortar round had fallen near the camp [where] they were staying," the 10-nation Southern African Development Community (SADC) said in a statement.  It gave no further details.  A source at the North Kivu governorate said the mortar attack struck last Thursday and a ceremony to honor the dead was held at SADC headquarters in the provincial capital, Goma, on Monday.  A soldier from South Africa has also died in a hospital while being treated for health problems, the SADC statement said.  After several years of dormancy, the mostly Tutsi M23 (March 23 Movement) group took up arms again in late 2021 and has seized swaths of North Kivu province.  Decades of violence  The region has been beset by violence in the decades since regional wars in the 1990s.  The DRC, the U.N. and Western countries accuse Rwanda of supporting the rebels in a bid to control the region's vast mineral resources, an allegation Kigali denies.  The force suffered its first losses in mid-February when two South African soldiers were killed by mortars at Mubambiro camp, near the town of Sake, about 20 kilometers (12 miles) from Goma.  A Congolese security source, asking not to be named, said the Tanzanian casualties happened at the same camp.  The force was to take over from an East African peacekeeping force, whose mandate was ended by Kinshasa, which accused it of colluding with the rebels instead of fighting them.  The U.N. mission in the DRC, MONUSCO, is also being wound down.  The 15,000 U.N. troops deployed in the vast central African country started to leave in February at the request of the Kinshasa government, which considers them ineffective.  The withdrawal is due to be completed by the end of the year.  According to an internal U.N. document seen by AFP, M23 rebels have made new gains in the east after Indian U.N. troops abandoned positions near Goma.  MONUSCO said in a note to staff that "the current security situation is becoming increasingly volatile as M23 has reached the northern outskirts of Sake."  The population of Goma has doubled to 2 million as refugees have fled the advance of the rebel group.  Residents said that M23 and Congolese forces exchanged artillery fire throughout the weekend around Sake and the western outskirts of Goma. 

U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump says laws against abortion should continue to be made by each state. That position goes against some of his supporters who want a nationwide abortion ban. VOA correspondent Scott Stearns has our story.

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Maputo, Mozambique   — At least 97 people died when an overloaded boat capsized and sank off the coast of Mozambique late Sunday, state-run Radio Mozambique reported, citing local officials.  Radio Mozambique on Monday quoted Silveiro Nauaito, administrator of Mozambique’s northern province of Nampula, as saying those aboard the boat, largely women and children, were traveling from the northern Lunga district to a small island off the coast known as Mozambique Island. He said the 130 passengers were allegedly fleeing because of disinformation about a cholera outbreak and were headed to the island in search of health care. Nauaito said rescue teams had found 12 survivors and were searching for more, but poor weather at sea was making the operation more difficult. He said 91 bodies were found on Sunday and six others early on Monday. About 40 bodies have been taken to either the island or the mainland, and burials of the victims have begun, he said. Since January, Mozambique has been battling to contain a deadly cholera outbreak in its northern regions, a health crisis that has also affected neighboring countries such as Malawi and Zambia. The secretary of state in Nampula province, Jaime Neto, told VOA in a telephone interview that the boat could have been hit by a giant wave but it was also overcrowded and not suitable for carrying passengers. He also attributed the overcrowding of the boat to misinformation about the cholera outbreak. The vessel "was not prepared to take passengers. It ended up sinking and creating this situation that the province regrets." Boat travel is a major means of transport in Mozambique, which has a dilapidated road network. Accidents are common on the country’s rivers, lakes and Indian Ocean coast, with most due to poor maintenance of the vessels or overcrowding.

new orleans — Clarence “Frogman” Henry, who was one of New Orleans’ best known old-time R&B singers and scored a hit at age 19 with “Ain't Got No Home," has died. He was 87. Henry died Sunday night, the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Foundation said on social media. It didn't give the cause of death. Henry, who had been scheduled to perform at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival later this month, imitated the voice of a frog in “Ain't Got No Home.” It was a hit in 1956 and later brought Henry renewed fame when it was featured on the “Forrest Gump” and “Mickey Blue Eyes” soundtracks. He credited disc jockey Poppa Stoppa, whose real name was Clarence Hayman, as coming up with the nickname the “Frogman,” which mimicked Fats Domino's moniker the “Fatman.” By 1958, Henry’s popularity waned, and he took to playing nightclubs on Bourbon Street. “I thought the sun would shine. I thought my record would always stay out there and stay on the top, but in 1958, the rain came and bring me back to New Orleans,” Henry told The Associated Press in 2003. But in 1960, a new song, “I Don’t Know Why But I Do” by Cajun songwriter Bobby Charles and arranged by Allen Toussaint, brought Henry renewed success. With the Bill Black Combo and the Jive Five, he opened for the Beatles for 18 dates in 1964 during their first U.S. trip and toured extensively, from Scotland to New Zealand. In Louisiana, Henry remained popular. He also was one of the few Black New Orleans musicians to cross over into Cajun musical circles. Henry, who was born in New Orleans on March 19, 1937, started playing the piano at 8, taking up lessons his sister had disliked. He worked for his father until he was 15, often for no money. He played the trombone and piano in his high school band and later joined The Toppers, traveling around southern Louisiana before making it big. “When I was going to school, I wanted to be Fats Domino, Professor Longhair, and I would wear a wig with two plaits and call myself Professor Longhair,” Henry told the AP. “I like the Fats Domino rhythm, but I play my own chords and my own style.” Henry's national fame faded but he remained popular in Louisiana. He was a Bourbon Street fixture until 1981, when he retired from the grueling club circuit. But he never gave up music and continued to be an annual crowd pleaser at the Jazz & Heritage Festival. Funeral arrangements are pending at the Murray Henderson Funeral Home.

abuja, nigeria — Nigeria's former central bank governor on Monday pleaded not guilty to fresh charges brought against him by the country's anti-corruption body, The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, or EFCC, last week filed 26 charges accusing Godwin Emefiele of corrupt practices and misuse of authority while in office. Emefiele appeared before the Lagos State High Court on Monday with a co-defendant, Henry Omoile. In its suit filed April 3, the EFCC said Emefiele violated Nigeria’s corrupt practices act by receiving bribes and gifts and acquiring property through fraud. The EFCC also accused Emefiele of arbitrarily allocating $2 billion dollars in foreign exchange without bids or due process and conferring undue advantage to his associates. Emefiele and Omoile both pleaded not guilty to the charges. But the court remanded Emefiele into custody until Thursday, when a verdict on his bail application is expected. Emefiele's legal counsel was not immediately available to comment on the new charges. But public affairs analyst Chris Kwaja said, "On the strength of the allegations, if he's found wanting them, he'll face justice as required by the laws of the land. For every individual that has been given the mandate to occupy public office, that mandate is a product of trust. This case represents that. The only thing for me is that in pursuit of accountability, the Nigerian state must be conscious of the right of every individual." Former President Goodluck Jonathan appointed Emefiele as CBN governor in 2014, and he served until last year. He was arrested in June, days after President Bola Tinubu took office. Last year, the former Central Bank governor faced charges in another court in  Abuja, for illegally awarding contracts and violating Nigeria’s procurement laws — charges that he denied. Eze Onyekpere, founder of the Center for Social Justice, wondered whether the government was looking for a scapegoat. "I'm getting a bit worried, because we've seen this happen before in previous administrations," Onyekpere said. "Let it not appear to be looking for a fall guy,  somebody that could easily be shaken off ... and trying to provide excuses for their inability to manage the economy very well. It's beginning to look a little bit not based on empirical legal evidence." Emefiele withdrew from a possible presidential bid in 2022. Last July, Tinubu hired a special investigator to scrutinize the operations of the Central Bank under Emefiele. On Friday, the investigator said his work was complete, but his report has not been released.

CHILPANCINGO, Mexico — Protesters in southern Mexico set the state government building afire Monday and torched at least a dozen cars in the parking lot.  The protests occurred in the violence-wracked city of Chilpancingo, the capital of the Pacific coast state of Guerrero.  The protesters are demanding answers in the case of 43 students at a rural teachers’ college who disappeared in 2014. Another student from that college was killed in a confrontation with police in March.  The Guerrero state government said in a statement that it “regrets and condemns the violent acts.” The government noted the state interior secretary had resigned following the March confrontation with students. The police officers involved are under investigation in the death.  Images of the protests showed at least a dozen vehicles engulfed in fire and flames shooting out of the windows of the state office building, which is near the main highway leading from Mexico City to Acapulco. The building, which houses the governor's office, was ransacked.  Students at the radical Ayotzinapa teachers’ college, located on the outskirts of Chilpancingo, are known for their violent protests, which often involve hijacking buses and delivery trucks.  In March, protesters allied with the college commandeered a pickup truck and used it to ram down the wooden doors of Mexico City’s National Palace.  They battered down the doors and entered the colonial-era palace, where the president lives and holds his daily news briefings, before they were driven off by security agents. The palace is a historic structure dating back to the 1700s and was built on the site of the Aztec emperors’ palace.  The demonstration, like many others over the years, was called to protest the abduction and murder of 43 students a decade ago. The mass disappearance remains one of Mexico’s most infamous human rights cases.  In 2014, a group of students were attacked by municipal police in the southern city of Iguala, Guerrero, who handed them over to a local drug gang that apparently killed them and burned their bodies. Since the September 26 attack, only three of their remains have been identified.  After an initial cover up, last year a government truth commission concluded that local, state and federal authorities colluded with the gang to murder the students in what it called a “state crime.”  The under-funded radical rural teachers’ colleges in Mexico have a decades-long tradition of violent protests. In fact, when they were abducted, the students themselves had been hijacking passenger buses which they were going to use to travel to another protest. 

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ISLAMABAD — The World Health Organization said Monday that the recent return of about 600,000 undocumented migrants from Pakistan to Afghanistan and an estimated 200,000 unvaccinated children in southern Afghan regions are a threat to regional gains against polio.    In its latest assessment of the disease's international spread, WHO said that both neighboring countries had made significant progress in interrupting the transmission of the two surviving genetic clusters of wild poliovirus type 1 (WPV1) in the region.   Pakistan and Afghanistan, the last two nations where the crippling virus is still found, have reported two and zero cases of polio infections, respectively, this year.   However, the WHO assessment said that the recent large-scale displacement of undocumented Afghans from Pakistan had “increased the risk of cross-border poliovirus spread, as well as [the] spread within both countries.” It cautioned that “any setback in Afghanistan poses a risk to the [polio] program in Pakistan due to high population movement.”  The report stated that coordinated efforts were being made to “manage and mitigate” the risk through vaccination at border crossing points between the two countries.     WHO said vaccination coverage in southern Afghan provinces of Helmand, Kandahar, Uruzgan, Zabul and Nimruz has improved “but remains suboptimal, with an estimated 200,000 children who remain unreached.” The large pool of unvaccinated children “constitutes a major risk,” it said.  The report stressed that house-to-house immunizations of children are comparatively effective, but some parts of Afghanistan “still only allow site-to-site or mosque-to-mosque vaccinations.”  It appreciated the Taliban government's commitment to the global goal of eradicating polio in Afghanistan. WHO noted and praised the increased use of Afghan female health care workers in campaigns and strongly encouraged the implementation of house-to-house campaigns where feasible.  The fundamentalist Taliban have banned women from many public and private sector workplaces, but the health sector is mostly exempted from the restrictions.

Manama, Bahrain — Bahrain's king has pardoned 1,584 people facing criminal and "riot" charges, state media said Monday, in the largest such mass release in the Gulf nation in years.  The announcement of the royal decree carried by the official Bahrain News Agency (BNA) did not specify whether political prisoners are among those to be released, though a rights group said it was likely.  BNA said that "this royal decree reflects his majesty's keenness to maintain the cohesion and stability of the Bahraini society, while protecting its social fabric."    The pardons cover "those convicted for riot and criminal cases" and were announced as Bahrain's King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa marks 25 years since his ascension to the throne, BNA added.  Sayed Alwadaei, advocacy director for the Britain-based Bahrain Institute for Rights and Democracy (BIRD), said political prisoners were probably included in the pardon "as the term 'riot' refers to those who demanded political change."  BIRD said the latest royal decree marks the "highest number of pardoned prisoners since the pro-democracy uprising in 2011," when anti-government protests triggered a state crackdown.  However, a government spokesman told AFP: "There are no political prisoners in the Kingdom of Bahrain. No one is detained for expressing his or her peaceful political views.  "However, the authorities have a duty to investigate and if appropriate prosecute individuals — as in all countries — when conduct strays into violence or seeks to incite violence or hatred,” the spokesman said.  The royal decree also comes ahead of the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr, which marks the end of the fasting month of Ramadan, an occasion that often elicits prison pardons from Gulf leaders.  Bahrain has imprisoned scores of dissidents since the 2011 protest wave, when authorities backed by a Saudi military force crushed Shiite-led demonstrations demanding a constitutional monarchy and an elected prime minister.  In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, Bahrain's interior ministry announced in 2020 the release of 1,486 prisoners, including 901 who had received royal pardons on "humanitarian grounds."

NEW YORK — Donald Trump asked a New York appeals court on Monday to reverse his gag order and move his hush money criminal trial out of Manhattan in an eleventh-hour bid for a delay just a week before it is scheduled to start.  A judge in the state's mid-level appeals court was to hold an emergency hearing Monday afternoon after the former president's lawyers filed paperwork challenging Manhattan Judge Juan M. Merchan's pretrial rulings.  The documents were placed under seal, but a person familiar with the matter told The Associated Press they pertained to Trump's gag order — recently expanded to prohibit comments about the judge's family — and the Republican's desire to move the trial out of heavily Democratic Manhattan. The person was unauthorized to speak publicly and did so on the condition of anonymity.  Messages seeking comment were left for Trump's lawyers, the Manhattan district attorney's office and a spokesperson for New York's state court system.  Trump had pledged to appeal after Merchan ruled last month that the trial would begin April 15. His lawyers had pleaded to delay the trial at least until summer to give them more time to review late-arriving evidence from a prior federal investigation into the matter.  Merchan, who had already moved the trial from its original March 25 start date because of the evidence issue, said no further delays were warranted.  Trump's lawyers filed their appeals Monday on two separate court dockets. One was styled as a lawsuit against Merchan, a legal mechanism allowing them to challenge his rulings.  In New York, judges can be sued over some judicial decisions under a state law known as Article 78. Trump has used the tactic before, including against the judge in his civil fraud case in an unsuccessful last-minute bid to delay that case last fall.  A clerk at the appeals court, the Appellate Division of the state's trial court, said no documents were publicly available from either appeal docket.  Trump's hush money trial is the first of his four criminal indictments slated to go to trial and would be the first criminal trial ever of a former president.  Trump is accused of falsifying his company's records to hide the nature of payments to his former lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen, who helped him bury negative stories during his 2016 campaign. Cohen's activities included paying porn actor Stormy Daniels $130,000 to suppress her claims of an extramarital sexual encounter with Trump years earlier.  Trump pleaded not guilty last year to 34 felony counts of falsifying business records. He has denied having a sexual encounter with Daniels. His lawyers argue the payments to Cohen were legitimate legal expenses.  Trump's move Monday is the latest escalation in his battles with Merchan.  The presumptive Republican presidential nominee assailed the judge on social media after he imposed a gag order last month barring Trump from making public statements about jurors, witnesses and others connected the case. After Trump's complaints, Merchan expanded the gag order to include members of his own family.  Last week, Trump renewed his request for the judge to step aside from the case, citing Merchan's daughter's work as the head of a firm whose clients have included his rival President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris and other Democrats.  The former president alleges the judge is biased against him and has a conflict of interest because of his daughter's work. The judge rejected a similar request last August.  Trump has also made numerous other attempts to get the trial postponed, echoing a strategy he's deployed in his other criminal cases. "We want delays," Trump proclaimed to TV cameras outside a February pretrial hearing in his hush money case.  Merchan last week rejected his request to delay the trial until after the U.S. Supreme Court rules on presidential immunity claims he raised in another of his criminal cases.  The New York judge has yet to rule on another defense delay request, which claims that Trump won't get a fair trial because of "prejudicial media coverage." Trump has suggested on social media that the trial should be moved to Staten Island, the only New York City borough he won in 2016 and 2020.

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The head of the U.N.'s atomic watchdog agency is warning of a potentially dangerous situation following a drone strike on one of six nuclear reactors at the Russian-controlled Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant in Ukraine. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy warns Ukraine could run out of air defense missiles if Russia keeps up its intense long-range-bombing campaign. While NATO members vow to support Kyiv, U.S. aid is still in limbo. The story of an American who joined Ukraine’s military efforts following Russia’s invasion and how a Ukrainian woman stepped into her husband’s job as a blacksmith after he joined his country’s armed forces.

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