Key votes on rent control, tenant protections, a public safety committee and other hot-button issues loom before the St. Paul City Council, but the first order of business will be to appoint an interim and potentially tie-breaking seventh member, a process that has proven to be unexpectedly contentious.

A divided city council voted 3-2 on Wednesday to recommend lobbyist and clean energy advocate Matt Privratsky for the newly vacant Ward 4 seat, following some pointed words between council members who said they were taken aback by the process. Their final vote on the five-month appointment will be held Friday.

The council received 20 applications to fill the temporary appointment and interviewed four finalists last week: artist and community organizer Sean Lim, art conservator and neighborhood advocate Lisa Clare Nelson, nonprofit consultant Melissa Martinez-Sones and Privratsky, who had previously served as a legislative aide in the Ward 4 office.

A general timeframe announced by the council’s director of operations on March 17 called for the council to vote on the interim appointment on March 26, and then swear in the appointee in early April.

Amendment

On Wednesday, Council President Rebecca Noecker was unexpectedly absent because of a family issue, leaving just five of seven members to vote on recommending an appointee by resolution. Council Member Saura Jost provided a written amendment intended to insert Privratsky’s name into the blank spaces on the draft resolution, with a final vote to be laid over to 3 p.m. on Friday.

Appearing taken aback, Council Vice President HwaJeong Kim — who acted as meeting chair in Noecker’s absence — called for a recess, left the table to confer with others, and then returned a few minutes later.

“I don’t feel that this would pass with Council President Noecker here,” Kim said, adding later: “This amendment is not the intended name to be inserted into the resolution on Friday.”

Kim motioned to hold off on inserting any name into the resolution language until Friday, but her request failed 3-2. Jost then read aloud her recommendation to add Privratsky, noting he had previously served as former Council President Mitra Jalali’s legislative aide and “he understands Ward 4, its current top issues, navigating them, and the work (required).”

‘What you’re doing is very inappropriate’

Expressing alarm, Council Member Nelsie Yang said she felt Jost was “taking advantage” of Noecker’s absence to push through an appointment that might not otherwise get approved.

“I’m very taken aback by your resolution,” Yang said. “There were previous conversations to figure out a proper date and time so everyone could be present. That was done … out of respect. This is a vote that will have impact citywide, and this is a colleague.”

“I really have no words,” Yang added. “What you’re doing is very inappropriate.”

Yang then added: “I’ll be really frank. You’re going to be out sometimes, too.”

Jost reminded her that the vote was not final, and the council can revisit the issue Friday.

Council Member Cheniqua Johnson said Jost’s recommendation was “the first amendment that I’ve seen with an actual name attached to the item,” and “this is a reflection of what this has been like internally.” She noted, however, that she was “working really hard to make sure that I’m operating not only in the best interest of our council, but our Ward 4 residents.”

The council then voted to support Jost’s amendment, with Anika Bowie, Johnson and Jost voting in favor and Kim and Yang opposed. The council will reconvene at 3 p.m. Friday to finalize the appointment.

The Ward 4 appointee will serve through the ranked-choice election on Aug. 12, which has already drawn multiple candidates. The winner of that election will serve through 2028.

Jalali announced in January her plans to vacate her seat and officially left city employment on March 8.

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By SAMY MAGDY, FATMA KHALED and SARAH EL DEEB, Associated Press

CAIRO (AP) — Thousands of Palestinians marched between the wreckage of a heavily destroyed town in northern Gaza on Wednesday in the second day of anti-war protests, with many chanting against Hamas in a rare display of public anger against the group.

The protests, which centered mainly on Gaza’s north, appeared to be aimed generally against the war, with protesters calling for an end to 17 months of deadly fighting with Israel that has made life in Gaza insufferable.

But protesters also leveled unusually direct and public criticism of Hamas, which has quashed dissent violently in the past in Gaza, a territory it still rules months into the war with Israel.

Palestinians chant slogans during an anti-war protest and against Hamas in a rare show of public anger against the group that rules the territory, in Beit Lahiya, northern Gaza Strip, Wednesday, March 26, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)

Hamas has been designated as a terrorist organization by the United States, Canada and the European Union.

In the town of Beit Lahiya, where a similar protest took place Tuesday, about 3,000 people demonstrated, with many chanting “the people want the fall of Hamas.” In the hard-hit Shijaiyah neighborhood of Gaza City, dozens of men chanted “Out, out out! Hamas get out!”

“Our children have been killed. Our houses have been destroyed,” said Abed Radwan, who said he joined the protest in Beit Lahiya “against the war, against Hamas, and the (Palestinian political) factions, against Israel and against the world’s silence.”

Palestinians chant slogans during an anti-war protest and against Hamas in a rare show of public anger against the group that rules the territory, in Beit Lahiya, northern Gaza Strip, Wednesday, March 26, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)

Ammar Hassan, who took part in a protest Tuesday, said it started as an anti-war protest with a few dozen people but swelled to more than 2,000, with people chanting against Hamas.

“It’s the only party we can affect,” he said by phone. “Protests won’t stop the (Israeli) occupation, but it can affect Hamas.”

Hamas has violently cracked down on previous protests. This time no outright intervention was apparent, perhaps because the group is keeping a lower profile since Israel resumed its war against it.

Senior Hamas official Bassem Naim, in a post on Facebook, wrote that people had the right to protest but that their focus should be on the “criminal aggressor,” Israel.

‘We want to stop the killing’

Family elders from Beit Lahiya expressed support for the protests against Israel’s renewed offensive and its tightened blockade on all supplies into Gaza. Their statement said the community fully supports armed resistance against Israel.

“The protest was not about politics. It was about people’s lives,” said Mohammed Abu Saker, a father of three from the nearby town of Beit Hanoun, who joined a demonstration Tuesday.

“We want to stop the killing and displacement, no matter the price. We can’t stop Israel from killing us, but we can press Hamas to give concessions,” he said.

Palestinians chant slogans during an anti-war protest and against Hamas in a rare show of public anger against the group that rules the territory, in Beit Lahiya, northern Gaza Strip, Wednesday, March 26, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)

A similar protest occurred in the heavily destroyed area of Jabaliya on Tuesday, according to witnesses.

One protester in Jabaliya, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retribution, said they joined the demonstration because “everyone failed us.”

They said they chanted against Israel, Hamas, the Western-backed Palestinian Authority and Arab mediators. They said there were no Hamas security forces at the protest but scuffles broke out between supporters and opponents of the group.

Later, they said they regretted participating because of Israeli media coverage, which emphasized the opposition to Hamas.

Palestinians attend an anti-war protest and against Hamas in a rare show of public anger against the group that rules the territory, in Beit Lahiya, northern Gaza Strip, Wednesday, March 26, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz urged Palestinians to join the protests.

“You too should demand the removal of Hamas from Gaza and the immediate release of all Israeli hostages. That is the only way to stop the war,” he said.

A 19-year-old Palestinian, who also spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retribution said he planned to join demonstrations on Wednesday. His mother has cancer and his 10-year-old brother is hospitalized with cerebral palsy, and he said the family has been displaced multiple times since their home was destroyed.

“People are angry at the whole world,” including the United States, Israel and Hamas, he said. “We want Hamas to resolve this situation, return the hostages and end this whole thing.”

Palestinians chant slogans during an anti-war protest and against Hamas in a rare show of public anger against the group that rules the territory, in Beit Lahiya, northern Gaza Strip, Wednesday, March 26, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)

Renewed fighting brings more death and displacement

The protests erupted a week after Israel ended its ceasefire with Hamas by launching a surprise wave of strikes that killed hundreds of people. Earlier this month, Israel halted deliveries of food, fuel, medicine and humanitarian aid to Gaza’s roughly 2 million Palestinians.

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Israel has vowed to escalate the war until Hamas returns the 59 hostages it still holds — 24 of them believed to be alive. Israel is also demanding that the group give up power, disarm and send its leaders into exile.

Hamas has said it will only release the remaining captives in exchange for Palestinian prisoners, a lasting ceasefire and an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza.

The war was triggered by Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack into Israel, in which Palestinian combatants killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducted 251.

Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed over 50,000 people, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not say how many were civilians or combatants. Israel’s bombardment and ground operations have caused vast destruction and at their height displaced some 90% of Gaza’s population.

Hamas won a landslide victory in the last Palestinian elections, held in 2006. It seized power in Gaza from the Western-backed Palestinian Authority, dominated by the secular Fatah movement, the following year after months of factional unrest and a week of heavy street battles.

Rights groups say both the Palestinian Authority and Hamas violently suppress dissent, quashing protests in the areas they control and jailing and torturing critics.

El Deeb reported from Beirut.

By KIM TONG-HYUNG, Associated Press

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea’s truth commission concluded the government bears responsibility for facilitating a foreign adoption program rife with fraud and abuse, driven by efforts to reduce welfare costs and enabled by private agencies that often manipulated children’s backgrounds and origins.

The landmark report released Wednesday followed a nearly three-year investigation into complaints from 367 adoptees in Europe, the United States, and Australia, representing the most comprehensive examination yet of South Korea’s foreign adoptions, which peaked under a succession of military governments in the 1970s and ’80s.

The government-appointed Truth and Reconciliation Commission said it confirmed human rights violations in 56 of the complaints and aims to review the remaining cases before its mandate expires in late May.

However, some adoptees and even a commission investigator criticized the cautiously written report, acknowledging that investigative limitations prevented the commission from more strongly establishing the government’s complicity.

Peter Møller, left, Boonyoung Han, second from left, co-founders of the Danish Korea Rights Group, and adoptee Yooree Kim, second from right, attend a press conference at the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in Seoul, South Korea, Wednesday, March 26, 2025. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

That investigator, Sang Hoon Lee, also lamented that the panel on Tuesday deferred assessments of 42 other adoptees’ cases, citing a lack of documentation to sufficiently prove their adoptions were problematic. Lee and the commission chairperson, Sun Young Park, did not specify which types of documents were central to the discussions.

However, Lee implied that some members of the commission’s decision-making committee were reluctant to recognize cases in which adoptees had yet to prove beyond doubt that the biological details in their adoption papers had been falsified — either by meeting their birth parents or confirming information about them.

Most Korean adoptees were registered by agencies as abandoned orphans, although they frequently had relatives who could be easily identified or found, a practice that often makes their roots difficult or impossible to trace. Government data obtained by The Associated Press shows less than a fifth of 15,000 adoptees who have asked South Korea for help with family searches since 2012 have managed to reunite with relatives.

Lee said the committee’s stance reflects a lack of understanding of the systemic problems in adoptions and risks excluding many remaining cases.

“Personally, I find yesterday’s decision very regrettable and consider it a half-baked decision,” Lee said.

Promoting adoptions to reduce mouths to feed

After reviewing government and adoption records and interviewing adoptees, birth families, public officials and adoption workers, the commission assessed that South Korean officials saw foreign adoptions as a cheaper alternative to building a social welfare system for needy children.

Through policies and laws that promoted adoption, South Korea’s military governments permitted private adoption agencies to exercise extensive guardianship rights over children in their custody and swiftly transfer custody to foreign adopters, resulting in “large-scale overseas placements of children in need of protection,” the commission said.

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Authorities provided no meaningful oversight as adoption agencies engaged in dubious or illicit practices while competing to send more children abroad. These practices included bypassing proper consent from biological parents, falsely documenting children with known parents as abandoned orphans, and switching children’s identities, according to the commission’s report. It cited that the government failed to ensure that agencies properly screened adoptive parents or prevent them from excessively charging foreign adopters, who were often asked to make additional donations beyond the standard fees.

The commission’s findings broadly aligned with previous reporting by The AP. The AP investigations, which were also documented by Frontline (PBS), detailed how South Korea’s government, Western countries and adoption agencies worked in tandem to supply some 200,000 Korean children to parents overseas, despite years of evidence that many were being procured through questionable or outright unscrupulous means.

The military governments implemented special laws aimed at promoting foreign adoptions, removing judicial oversight and granting vast powers to private agencies, which bypassed proper child relinquishment practices while shipping thousands of children to the West every year. Western nations ignored these problems and sometimes pressured South Korea to keep the kids coming as they focused on satisfying their huge domestic demands for babies.

“The commission determined that the state violated the human rights of adoptees protected under the constitution and international agreements, by neglecting its duty to ensure basic human rights, including inadequate legislation, poor management and oversight, and failures in implementing proper administrative procedures while sending large numbers of children abroad,” the commission said in a statement. It said the government “actively utilized” foreign adoptions, which “required no budget allocation,” rather than strengthening a social safety net for needy children.

When asked why the commission’s report focused on the government’s negligence and monitoring failures, rather than highlighting its more direct responsibility for creating a system that put children at risk, Lee acknowledged a need for a deeper investigation into the government’s role, citing limitations in the commission’s reach.

A more extensive review of the systemic problems would require a closer look at adoptions to the United States, which by far was the largest recipient of Korean children, Lee said. U.S. adoptees accounted for a smaller number of complaints received by the commission, most of which were filed by adoptees in Europe.

“Rather than producing a final conclusion, we focused on pointing out the problems the best we could,” Lee said.

Commission calls for government apology

The commission recommended the government issue an official apology over the problems it identified and develop plans to address the grievances of adoptees who discovered that the biological origins in their adoption papers were falsified. It also urged the government to investigate citizenship gaps among adoptees sent to the United States and to implement measures to assist those without citizenship, who may number in the thousands.

South Korea’s government has never acknowledged direct responsibility for issues surrounding past adoptions. The Ministry of Health and Welfare, the government department that handles adoption issues, and adoption agencies didn’t immediately comment on the commission’s report.

During the news conference, Yooree Kim, who was sent at age 11 by an adoption agency to a couple in France without her biological parents’ consent, pleaded for the commission to strengthen its recommendations.

She said the government should encourage broader DNA testing for biological families to increase the chances of reunions with adoptees and officially declare an end to foreign adoptions. She said adoptees who fell victim to illicit practices should be entitled to “compensation from the Korean government and adoption agencies, without going through lawsuits.”

South Korea’s practices in the past seven decades formed what’s believed to be the world’s largest diaspora of adoptees. Recent reforms, including a 2011 law that required foreign adoptions go through family courts, have led to a significant decline, with only 79 cases of South Korean children placed abroad in 2023.

By JOVANA GEC and DUSAN STOJANOVIC, Associated Press

BELGRADE, Serbia (AP) — Ivana Ilic Sunderic had never heard anything quite so alarming and disturbing at a protest as the sound that broke a commemorative silence during a huge anti-government rally in Serbia’s capital, Belgrade.

“It was quiet and peaceful and then we heard something we could not see … like a sound rolling toward us, a whiz,” Ilic Sunderic said about the March 15 incident. “People started rushing for safety toward the pavement, feeling that something was moving toward us down the street.”

It was “a subdued sound lasting only 2-3 seconds but very unusual and very frightening, like a sound from hell,” she said.

In this photo provided by the Serbian Interior Ministry, Serbian Gendarmerie officers show the U.S.-made Long Range Acoustic Device (LRAD), which is illegal in Serbia and many other countries, in Belgrade, Serbia, Wednesday, March 19, 2025. (Serbian Ministry of Interior via AP)

Ilic Sunderic was not alone in describing the panic. Hundreds of others have offered similar accounts, triggering accusations that the police, military or security services under the tight control of authoritarian Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic used an acoustic crowd control weapon to target peaceful protesters.

The weapons, which are illegal in Serbia, emit sound waves which can trigger sharp ear pain, disorientation, eardrum ruptures or even irreversible hearing damage.

The incident piled more pressure on Vucic, who has been rattled by nearly five months of anti-corruption protests over the collapse in November of a concrete canopy at a railway station in the northern town of Novi Sad that killed 16 people.

In this photo provided by the Serbian Interior Ministry, Serbian Gendarmerie officers show the U.S.-made Long Range Acoustic Device (LRAD), which is illegal in Serbia and many other countries, in Belgrade, Serbia, Wednesday, March 19, 2025. (Serbian Ministry of Interior via AP)

Serbia’s officials have issued often contradictory denials that an acoustic weapon was directed at the demonstrators. Calls have been mounting for answers as to what caused the sudden commotion, if not a sonic device.

An Associated Press video shows thousands of protesters holding up their lit mobile phones in silence when they suddenly start running away in panic. A swooshing sound can then be heard.

“I have been going to protests for 30 years but I’ve never heard anything like this,” Ilic Sunderic said.

Lies and fabrications

A defiant Vucic has rejected what he called “lies and fabrications” that the security services targeted the demonstrators with a sonic device. He said that such accusations are part of an alleged Western-orchestrated ploy to topple him.

“If there was a single piece of evidence that a sound cannon was used against demonstrators, then I would no longer be president,” he said.

People observe 15 minutes of silence during a massive anti-government rally in Belgrade, Serbia, Saturday, March 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Marko Drobnjakovic)

Serbia’s police, army and the state security agency, BIA, initially all denied possessing the U.S.-made Long Range Acoustic Device (LRAD), which is illegal in Serbia and some other countries. When presented with photos of the device mounted on an off-road vehicle and deployed at the rally of hundreds of thousands of protesters, officials admitted possessing a sonic weapon, but insisted it was not used against the protesters.

The photos showed nothing more than “loudspeakers” that also are available on eBay, Interior Minister Ivica Dacic said. The rectangular devices, purchased from a U.S. supplier in 2021, serve to emit warnings to the crowds in case of major trouble, he said.

“Serbian police have never, including March 15, used any illegal or unallowed device that is not envisaged by the law, including the device known as a sound cannon,” Dacic said. “Police only use sound devices for warnings.”

People observe 15 minutes of silence during a massive anti-government rally in Belgrade, Serbia, Saturday, March 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Marko Drobnjakovic)

Sonic weapons use sound waves to incapacitate, disorient or harm individuals by harnessing acoustic energy, causing both physical and psychological effects, such as dizziness, disorientation or severe headaches.

Although often described as non-lethal, their use in military, law enforcement and covert operations has raised serious ethical concerns.

More recently, sonic devices have been used against Somali pirates as well as migrants in Greece and reportedly in Serbia.

Images from the Belgrade protest show what appears to be an LRAD 450XL.

The California-based manufacturer, Genasys, said on X that “the video and audio evidence we have seen and heard thus far does not support the use of an LRAD during the March 15th incident in Belgrade, Serbia.”

Hundreds complained of consequences

Many who were in the crowd later complained of headaches, confusion, ear pressure or nausea.

Sasa Cvrkovic, a 23-year-old political science student from Belgrade, described the sound as a “jet that flew past like some kind of wind.” He said that it created panic and a brief stampede: “One young man next to me broke his leg.”

People observe 15 minutes of silence during a massive anti-government rally in Belgrade, Serbia, Saturday, March 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Marko Drobnjakovic)

Cvrkovic said he felt nauseous all through the day after the demonstration. Ilic Sunderic said she felt pressure in her head and ears.

Reports also have emerged of pressure on doctors at Serbia’s emergency clinics to withhold records of hundreds of people who sought medical help and advice after the rally.

Experts doubt the official version

Thomas Withington, an expert in electronic warfare, radar and military communications at the Royal United Services Institute think tank, said he reviewed some of the videos from the Belgrade stampede.

“Extraordinary film of people gathering, protesting in the streets peacefully, the demonstration,” he said in an interview. “And suddenly, an almost kind of biblical passing of a huge number of people in a very panicked rush, very sudden and very panicked movement, and the likes of which I must confess I’ve never seen before.”

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He said it was clear that something caused several hundred people to suddenly panic and move in a very specific way, rushing for cover to the pavement and abandoning the middle of the street.

“So certainly, the behavior that you see on the film does appear to be consistent with people reacting en masse to something that is making them feel deeply unsettled or deeply uncomfortable,” he said.

Predrag Petrovic, a research manager at the Belgrade Center for Security Policy, a think tank, said, “We can claim with huge probability that some unconventional weapon, some version of a sonic cannon, was used.”

“I have a lot of experience in participating and monitoring street protests and I have never seen a stampede happen in a second and along an almost straight line,” Petrovic said.

In an online petition signed by over half a million people, the Serbian opposition Move-Change movement asked the United Nations, the Council of Europe and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe for an independent investigation.

Several Serbian rights groups announced Tuesday they have taken the issue to the European Court of Human Rights, saying that they collected more than 4,000 testimonies from people who complained of various physical and psychological problems after the incident on March 15. The court in Strasbourg has given Serbia until the end of the month to respond, the groups said in a joint statement.

Vucic’s pro-Russia government, however, invited the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation and Russia’s Federal Security Service, the FSB, to investigate. There has been no immediate answer from the American and Russian security agencies.